Black Mirror (16 page)

“Andy, you say the boxes come back still sealed, the same way they went out. And they weigh the same?”

“They weigh the same.” Andy sounded very pleased with himself. “I can tell. And the packing tape hasn’t been changed. It looks the same as before. The same stuff must be inside. Does that make sense, Frances Leventhal?”

“Yes,” I said slowly. “It makes sense …”

I thought of all the things I’d seen at the pantry. Heaps of things. Shoes, clothing, toys. I burst out incredulously, “So wait. Nobody’s getting anything, then? No families are getting toys or cans or clothes? And nobody’s giving any of those things to the pantry? The same items cycle in and out? Pretend donations? Pretend charity?”

Andy frowned. “I don’t know. I just know it’s fake work.”

At that exact moment the lightbulb above my head stopped flickering; it came on and stayed on.

I wet my lips. I could feel my heart begin to pound. “It’s a front,” I said hoarsely. “The Unity food pantry is a front.” Presidential Freedom Medal. Biggest student charitable concern in the country. The same boxes. Carry in, carry out.
No charitable deliveries. No charitable donations. Fake work.

It wasn’t just one bulb above my head now. It was a whole sound-and-light show.

Unity was a front.

“
W
hat’s a front?” asked Andy.

It took me a minute to focus on his question. Other bits of knowledge were snaking through my bloodstream, threatening to paralyze me. Daniel—shaking his head in my dream. That lying letter of Patrick Leyden’s. The fact that Daniel’s note had been to Saskia. What I really did, and really didn’t, know about my brother …

I searched for words, soothing words that would hold off that darkness a little longer. I said slowly to Andy, “A front is a business operation that isn’t what it seems to be. Like, for example, a store that sells refrigerators, but their true business is something illegal like, oh, counterfeiting money in the back room, or—or selling drugs.” I felt my mittened hand go to my mouth, but it was too late.

I stopped walking. I stood on the sidewalk and, abruptly,
ceased to fight a battle I hadn’t even realized I was waging. I let a geyser of sounds and images swell up within me.

I let myself know what I knew.

When’s she going to figure out that it’s easier to do speed than throw up? Maybe somebody should ease her in with some diet pills.

Wallace Chan to James, my love, the small-time drug dealer, at that Pettengill meeting.
I can’t believe
you’d
seriously presume to lecture
us
about ethics.
The irony of it …

My subterranean feeling—for days, weeks, no, years—that lots of people—Daniel, Saskia, James—knew something I didn’t.

Saskia’s jewelry and clothes.

My wild musings about James running a drug empire at a prep school because the customers and money were plentiful.

As if I were operating a kaleidoscope, the things I’d seen or heard or knew whirled round and round and then settled into a complex but perfectly symmetrical pattern.

All these thoughts took only a few seconds. Meanwhile Andy had gone on a step or two, but then had turned back for me. “Frances Leventhal?” I was vaguely aware of him as he put out a hand and caught my arm. “Are you all right, Frances Leventhal?”

I was still looking at the pattern. It was not unlike the paintings on the walls of my room; obscured, but clear to anyone who took the time to see. And I might be slow, but in the end I always recognize when a picture speaks truth.

Even—or especially—when it’s ugly.

Unity Service was a front for a prep school drug dealing operation. And Daniel had been involved with them. He was no innocent, but—

I felt my lips move. “They killed my brother,” I whispered.

“What?” said Andy. He had both hands on my shoulders now. He was holding me upright. His hands tightened a little in anxiety, and somehow the feel of them brought me back to myself a little. His voice rose. “Frances Leventhal, what did you say? What about your brother?”

All at once I realized that I couldn’t get Andy tangled up in this … in this … whatever it was. And I was crazy! Daniel had killed himself—taken an overdose. There was no reason to leap to another conclusion. “Never mind,” I managed. “I’m sorry. I just—just …” I couldn’t think what to say.

I wanted—I couldn’t—I didn’t know—couldn’t assimilate—

I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t think. The police—I had to tell the police—but what about James—was he involved?—No! He couldn’t be. My brother—my father—Saskia—I couldn’t think—

Andy was looking down into my face. “You’re pale, Frances Leventhal. You’re sick again. I heard you were in the infirmary.”

“No, I’m not sick now …” I said. But I did feel sick.

A deep wrinkle cut straight across Andy’s forehead. “It’s
only a few minutes back to Pettengill. I can take you to the nurse.” His expression brightened. “I’ll carry you there. I’m very strong.” Before I could say anything, he stooped and all at once was carrying me in his arms, walking carefully, his face anxious. “Only five minutes,” he said. “Are you warm enough, Frances Leventhal? Say something!”

I wanted to say that I could walk, but I didn’t. “I’m warm,” I said confusedly. “I’m okay. I don’t want the nurse.”

“You’re sick again.”

“No …”

Andy had told the truth; he was very strong. I felt his arms beneath my back and legs; I felt oddly secure. I knew he wouldn’t drop me. My eyes squeezed shut. Where was my father? He never touched me.

I looped an arm around Andy’s neck and held on, to make it easier for him to carry me.

“You are sick,” said Andy definitely. “It’s because of what I told you. About the boxes and the fake work. I’m sorry, Frances Leventhal. It’s not important. I didn’t want you to get sick. The nurse will make you better.”

I opened my eyes. One thing stood out amid my confusion: I did not want to be taken to the nurse. The thought focused me, and I had a small brainstorm.

I said urgently, “Andy. I don’t want the nurse, but could you take me to see Ms. Wiles?”

Andy’s steps slowed a little. “The art teacher?”

“Yes.” I could hear the new strength in my voice. This was
a brilliant idea; in fact, it was the only idea. “Yvette Wiles. Her cottage is near yours. She’s not just a teacher; she’s a friend of mine.”

She was my friend. My friend who knew truth when she saw it, just like I did. My friend who’d called Patrick Leyden a dickhead. I could talk to Ms. Wiles. She’d believe me when I explained everything to her, because she knew me. She was the only one who knew me.

“Oh,” said Andy. Then, uncertainly: “Ms. Wiles will help you?”

I could feel myself lightening. “She will.” She would know what to do with the theory—the knowledge—that was filling me up like poison. She would know how I—how we—should act.

“Okay, Frances Leventhal,” said Andy. “If that is what you want, I will take you to Ms. Wiles.” I felt his stride widen a little. “Two minutes.”

“Great,” I said, and I could hear the relief in my voice; could feel my own too, all through my body.

Two minutes, and then I would no longer be alone.

F
rom the sofa in Ms. Wiles’s living room, with a teacup between my cold hands and an afghan over my knees, I marveled at how unaccustomed I was to being taken care of. “Lucky that I was making this big pot of stew,” Ms. Wiles called from the kitchen area. She turned and smiled at me. “We’ll have a nice chat, just the two of us, and you can tell me what’s got you so pale and weak-kneed. Then we’ll eat my stew.”

It sounded like heaven, even though I was now a little worried about how exactly I would explain my—what were they? suspicions?—to Ms. Wiles. My certainty that she would understand and believe me had faded in the ordinary warmth and sanity of her pretty cottage. It was very possible that she would think I was dramatizing, overreacting.

“Did you notice how I had to work to make Andy go
home?” Ms. Wiles continued. “He seems to be very fond of you, Frances.”

Was there something weird in her tone? I put my teacup down carefully. “I like Andy,” I said. “He’s a nice man. He’s
kind.
You saw how he helped me. We’re—I guess we’re sort of becoming friends.”

“Ah,” said Ms. Wiles.

I found I’d clenched my hands together. A string of sentences formed instantly and forcefully in my mind.
Retarded or not, I like Andy Jankowski better than anyone I know. And I bet he’s lonely! You might not know what that is, but I do. Would it have killed you to offer him a cup of tea too? You practically pushed him out the door!

Tears pressed at my eyelids. I didn’t let them fall. I was appalled at my own thoughts. I wanted to talk to Ms. Wiles alone, didn’t I? Wasn’t I glad she’d gotten rid of Andy? And surely I was imagining that she was implying something nasty about my newly-budding friendship with him.

Andy needs a friend, I thought fiercely, protectively. He needs a good, reliable friend. Later, I thought, when this is all over—I shied away from what exactly I meant by “this”—I’ll be his friend.

But right now, I knew, I needed Ms. Wiles, not Andy. I looked around the room, at all of Ms. Wiles’s lovely idiosyncratic things. I looked at the closed door of her sunporch studio. I remembered how much we had in common; how she had always understood me; how akin our souls were. I remembered what she’d said about Patrick Leyden. She
would believe me. She would help me. I would tell her my story, and we would eat her stew, and then we would go to the police together.

I sipped more tea and tried to relax, and Ms. Wiles came by with the teapot and poured me more, and then took a seat at the other end of the sofa and tucked her feet up under herself. “Now, Frances,” she said, and her pretty face was somehow both calm and concerned. “Tell me everything.”

I took a deep breath. Then I said bluntly to her: “I think that Unity isn’t a real charity, Ms. Wiles. I think it’s a front for a drug distribution ring. Students are involved, and some adults too. Patrick Leyden. He runs it, obviously.” I thought of the conversation I’d overheard between Wallace and Pammy. “And there’s alumni involvement too. I don’t know how it works, exactly. But I have some pieces, and I can guess.”

Ms. Wiles’s mouth had dropped open. She was staring at me and I couldn’t read her thoughts.

“Do you think I’m crazy?” I asked. “I’m not. I know this is true. I know it! And even if I am crazy, it won’t hurt to tell the police all this. Let me explain more.”

Finally Ms. Wiles reacted. She took a deep breath, shaking her head minutely, and then managed to smile. She said simply: “You astonish me, Frances. In more ways than you know. Okay. Go on. Explain.”

And my heart filled with gratitude.

She didn’t interrupt me, and after a couple of minutes I
wasn’t really even talking to her anymore; I was talking to myself. I jumped up and began pacing the room. I was thinking aloud, feeling more and more pieces slot in as I talked. Everything just poured out of me.

Suppose you’re Patrick Leyden. You’re a teenager, and a student at Pettengill, and you’re smart. You see that drug use is rampant at your school. There are lots of rich kids with money to spend and the inclination to spend it, and the police are busy stomping on drugs in the inner city, not in the educational institutions of the wealthy and privileged.

Relatively speaking, a place like Pettengill is actually kind of a safe place to buy and sell drugs. Everyone knows it’s happening, and everyone turns a blind eye. The adults say it’s just marijuana. Just steroids. Just diet pills. Oh, and a few designer pills sometimes, and a little coke, but that’s it. Kids will be kids. Everybody’s sophisticated; nobody really gets hurt; and God forbid there should be bad publicity that will damage the school’s reputation, upset the alumni, and discourage parents from enrolling their kids. So, as long as things are quiet, nobody does much to discourage what’s going on.

You see all this, and you realize that you could deal drugs yourself in a small way—“like James Droussian,” I said, and saw Ms. Wiles’s eyes flicker—but you have bigger ambitions. You figure that what goes on at one prep school goes on at another. You think, why should I make a small sum when, if I set things up properly, I could make really big bucks?

So you decide to create an organization.

“A secret organization?” said Ms. Wiles from her end of the sofa.

“A front,” I said again, impatiently. “A secret that looks like it’s not a secret. That’s what Unity is. A drug distribution network masquerading as a charitable organization, with its day-to-day business run by the poor students who took scholarships from the organization. Kids like Saskia. And—” I stuttered “—and my brother. Poor kids, looking for a way to fit in. Not that it would be only poor kids dealing—Unity has lots of regular kids too. But the poor kids are the vulnerable ones … and they wouldn’t need to openly deal. Not all of them. Not even most of them. There must be all kinds of jobs involved in a big operation like this.”

“And you think that Patrick Leyden conceived all this when he was a teenager himself?”

“Yes,” I said. “He started Unity back when he was a student. And he’s stayed involved all these years. It adds up. It all makes sense.”

“He doesn’t need drug money,” Ms. Wiles remarked. “He has his Internet company, Cognitive Reach. It’s very successful.”

“He started Cognitive Reach with drug money,” I said excitedly. “I’m sure of it. I mean—I don’t
know
, but it would make sense.” I sank back onto the sofa. “Listen, Ms. Wiles, Daniel was obsessed with Patrick Leyden. He read all the news and background information he could find on him and on Cognitive Reach. He was always talking about him. And
I remember—I think I remember—there were several anonymous ‘angel’ investors in the early stage of the company. They gave huge sums of money to get the company off the ground and their names were never revealed. And I’m betting that money was Patrick Leyden’s Unity drug money, fronted by others.” I stopped. I could read Ms. Wiles’s expression now, and it wasn’t one of belief and engagement. “I know it sounds far-fetched,” I said defensively. “And okay, I’m just guessing at pieces of this …”