Black Otter Bay (27 page)

Back in the lobby, she saw the outside door open and a woman enter. Marcy couldn't believe her eyes. Jackie strode through the door and into the lobby, smiling graciously in greeting to the doorman. Marcy ducked back into her aisle as the fears and queasiness came rushing back. “You stupid idiot,” she hissed at herself. “Why didn't you leave when you were supposed to?”

She chanced another peek around the corner. Jackie stood in the lobby, her hands in the pockets of a dark woolen coat, reading flyers on the bulletin board. Marcy shook her head.
If she comes this way, I'm toast.
She hustled back to the slot machine, noting the old woman still watching her with a placid, expressionless stare. It was the same vacant look she'd seen on so many of the customers, like addicts awaiting their next fix. Marcy hunched over in her “hiding” position atop the stool. Her mind reeling, she attempted to read the instructions before her. Then, bewildered, she reached around the side of the machine, slapping at it with the palm of her hand. Turning to the woman beside her, she asked, “Don't you even pull a handle on these things?”

The old lady didn't respond, and acted like she hadn't even understood her words.

Marcy said, “I thought they called them ‘One-Armed Bandits.'” She sighed in frustration as another scene from her Las Vegas movie was erased.

Sitting forward for a closer look at the machine, she was startled when the old woman suddenly leaned in at her side. With a fragile, crooked finger, she pointed at buttons in front of Marcy. She mumbled something completely incoherent and pointed at more buttons, but Marcy was too distracted by Jackie's arrival to pay attention. She scrambled down off her stool and, using pantomime, motioned for the woman to take her seat.

Returning to the head of the aisle, she peeked out to the lobby again and was surprised to see Jackie departing through the front door. Why was she leaving so soon, and where was she going? Marcy wanted to run after her, maybe follow her into the night, but before she could make a move, she heard her machine go crazy.

Looking behind her, Marcy saw a miniature light show going off in her aisle. The machine whistled and clanged. Her first thought was that somehow she'd broken it. With a frown,
Marcy took a step down the aisle toward it, but then abruptly turned around and made a dash for the lobby.

At the door, she spotted a charter bus parked at the curb. Along the side of it she read the name of another casino outside of town, a much larger establishment than this one, with a hotel and restaurants attached as well as a theater for live entertainment. She watched as Jackie climbed the steps and disappeared into the bus.

Marcy ran back inside. People looked at her as she hustled through the casino to her aisle. When she rounded the corner, however, she stopped in her tracks. The light show still exploded across the far end of the aisle. The old woman had taken Marcy's seat, and the machine in front of her buzzed and clanged like a New Year's Eve noisemaker. Whistles shrieked and bells rang. Strangers ran into the aisle, attracted by the noise, so Marcy eased her way forward with them. People were laughing and cheering, patting the old woman on the back, oblivious to the fact that this was Marcy's machine. After all, to the best of her knowledge, no one had actually seen her sitting there.

Marcy wormed her way up the aisle to stand beside the woman's stool. She wondered if the machine had short-circuited or something, but then the woman turned to look at her. The lifeless expression had been transformed into one of joy and good humor, causing Marcy to finally realize what had happened. The woman started to climb down off the stool, but Marcy put a hand out to stop her. “Please,” she said, pointing at the machine. “It's yours.”

The woman broke into a laugh and suddenly reached over to pull Marcy into a hug. “Oh!” Marcy exclaimed, surprised by this sudden act of affection. But then a security person was there, the very same guard who'd escorted her down the stairs. His attention, however, like everyone else's, was focused on the machine, waiting to see how much it would pay out. Marcy pulled back into the crowd of onlookers. She struggled against
the flow of curious well-wishers to make her way to the end of the aisle.

When she finally returned to the lobby, she paused at the spot where Jackie had stood. On the wall was a schedule for bus departures to the neighboring casino. Now it started to make sense. Of course Jackie wouldn't be caught dead hanging out in a place like this. Or, perhaps it was true that she did have some gambling debts, like rumor suggested, and her credit here had been cut off. Either way, she had a free ride to a bigger, classier place down the road. To Marcy's way of thinking, a place probably much more suited to Jackie's style.

She had no more use for this smoky, noisy, depressing place. The one thing she remembered the man in the camouflage cap saying was that even on a good day the nickel slot machines didn't pay out much. The old woman could have it; coaxing a smile out of that wrinkled old face was good enough for Marcy.

She offered a sweet smile to the doorman as she left. Outside, the temperature was dropping under the darkening sky over the harbor. She gulped fresh air while shaking off the creepy claustrophobia of the casino. Even the acrid aroma of the paper mill over the ridge in Cloquet, wafting down to the waterfront, was a delight to her deprived senses. With her mood quickly rebounding, Marcy dropped a few quarters into the outstretched fingers of a panhandler squatting against the building, then quickened her pace at the stoplight to cross the street. The warmer, friendlier lights of Canal Park were just a few blocks ahead.

Marcy strode down the hill toward the harbor, thinking back over her bizarre adventure. At least the man with the camouflage cap was gone. She felt a little bad about that, about how he'd stood up for her and she hadn't bothered to go outside to see if he was okay. But then, he had the look of someone familiar with the harder side of life, and she decided he'd probably be just fine.

All in all, Marcy figured she hadn't learned much of anything that would be of help to Abby, although she'd certainly learned something about Jackie. She held herself tightly against the enclosing chill, almost jogging now, putting the dark gray stone buildings of downtown behind her. She felt exhilarated, and burst into laughter at the memory of her beginner's luck. It would be fun to tell Owen and Red about it when she returned to work in the café. She still couldn't believe how much noise that machine had made, and on her very first try, no less! So engrossed was she in her thoughts, and so glad to be putting the whole escapade behind her, Marcy didn't notice when a shadow slipped out from a darkened office doorway. She wasn't aware of it trailing along beside her, either, just across the street.

Abby Simon

R
andall never did come home that evening. When Abby and Jackie returned to work after lunch, he was still busy in the office, and Abby couldn't help but notice his secretive behavior as he tended to his paperwork. The office door remained shut, further piquing her curiosity. Earlier, when she'd made her surprise appearance, she'd managed only a brief glimpse into the room because Jackie happened to be blocking most of the doorway. Now Abby learned that the room was virtually soundproof, and with no windows and just the one solid steel door, absolutely impregnable. The absurd notion that the office would make an ideal holding cell immediately wormed its way into her imagination, to the extent that it created an obsession of sorts for her get inside.

While Abby's admittance had been stymied, Jackie entered the office several times to talk to Randall. After the first of these meetings, the change in her mother's behavior had been obvious. Jackie chattered nonstop as she bustled about the gallery. She joked and laughed with enthusiasm, using outrageous, dramatic hand gestures while describing the artwork on the walls. Something had happened, Abby was sure of it, and the answer was in that rock-walled fortress of an office.

Dinner that evening was Chinese take-out they picked up on their walk home. Randall had finally left the gallery late in the afternoon, but the office door was locked tight when Abby quietly gave it a try. When he didn't show up for dinner, Jackie observed, “He does this all the time. He has his business buddies, you know. I think it's just an excuse to hit a few happy hours. Suits me just fine.”

Her mother's inane chattering kept up while they ate, until Jackie suddenly looked at her watch, stood up, and said, “I have to go out for a while.”

“What do you mean? I just got here. I thought we were going to hang out.”

Jackie whisked a stack of take-out containers to the refrigerator. “Tomorrow, honey. We'll work the gallery together, then we'll do something fun tomorrow night.”

Abby looked around the uncluttered, ultra-modern apartment. She didn't even see a TV. She hadn't wanted to be here in the first place, and now she was going to be left alone? Finding clues about her brother's whereabouts had been the motivation for coming to the city, but now she was being deserted by the two people she suspected might know something about Ben's disappearance. Besides, she thought, getting angry again, she wasn't even done with their conversation from earlier in the day at Sir Reginald's.

Jackie stood in front of the hall mirror to put on her black woolen coat. She took a brush from a drawer in the entryway table and swept it through the ends of her thick black hair. Abby said, “I thought you wanted to brush out my braid tonight.”

Jackie found her daughter in the mirror and said, “Not tonight, honey. You've had a long day. I really need to make this appointment.”

Abby watched her mother's fingers shake as she prepared to leave. She couldn't hold her daughter's gaze in the mirror, either. She watched as Jackie leaned toward the mirror for a closer inspection of her face, then stood back and straightened her coat. With a critical eye still on the mirror, she said, “Just relax tonight, sweetheart. Tomorrow will be a busy day. It'll be just you and me, with the whole city out there waiting for us.”

Abby grappled with her anger. She knew her mother was lying, or at the very least holding something back. Without considering her words, she blurted, “What happened at the gallery today?”

Jackie's departure plans were temporarily interrupted. When she finally looked at her daughter, neither one of them could muster up a smile. “What do you mean?”

Abby shrugged. “Something happened. After lunch, when you talked to Randall, all of a sudden you were all happy and stuff. Like you got some good news.” Jackie stared at her daughter, but concern now furled her brow. Abby realized her shot in the dark had hit something. “I thought maybe you'd heard something about Ben.”

Jackie's expression softened. She crossed the room and took both of Abby's hands in hers. “My dear little girl,” she cooed. “Is there anyone in the whole wide world as loyal and faithful as you?” She led Abby to the couch where they sat together, close upon each other, the young girl sitting up as straight and tall as her mother. “Abby, you have to give this a rest. We discussed it earlier. It will only lead to more heartache.”

Abby shook her head. “He's my brother, Mom. How can you ask me to let it go?” She saw no reason to confess that she felt responsible for Ben's disappearance.

“But Abby, there are good people working on this, people who know more about this stuff than we do. They're experts, trained to solve these kinds of things. We have to leave it to them to bring Ben home safe. Otherwise, who knows, you might just get in the way and make it worse.”

For the first time Abby had the feeling her mother was telling the truth, or at least not out-and-out lying, so she asked, “Well then, if there isn't news about Ben, what happened today that made you so happy?”

Jackie slapped her daughter on the knee and stood up. “Well, nothing really that will mean much to you, but the Bengston estate has been settled. Randall officially inherited everything, including the bait shop property.” She walked back across the room to study herself again in the entryway mirror. “You know he never felt any attachment to that old place.” She looked at Abby, still sitting on the couch. “So he already sold
it, signed over the papers today. Now we'll be able to do some really big things with the gallery.”

Abby felt small tucked into the corner of the sofa, like a little girl again, with big people saying things that she didn't really understand. It had only been a matter of weeks. She wasn't even used to the idea of Rosie being gone. Now the bait shop was going, too? “Who's buying it?” she asked. “Will it still be a bait shop?”

“Oh, dear, no,” Jackie said, laughing. “No one could make a living selling bait there. Not even Rosie. They'll tear down those old buildings and haul all that garbage away. It's a beautiful piece of shoreline, though.”

“I know. But it won't be the same without ‘Rosie's Bait.'”

Jackie turned to reach for the door. “Oh,” she said, looking back again. “There's a TV in the den, and some movies, too, I think.” She noticed Abby's glum scowl. “Hey, sweetheart, I know how difficult all these changes can be. But just think how beautiful Rose's place will be when they get the luxury condominiums put up. I think they even plan to build a marina where Henry's old breakwater used to be.” She offered Abby the warmest smile she could manage while still avoiding her gaze. She opened the door. “Get some rest, Abby. We have a big day ahead of us tomorrow. It'll be fun, you'll see.”

Abby continued to slouch on the sofa after her mother left. She didn't believe any of that crap about having a meeting tonight. The idea to follow her mother crossed her mind, but she still couldn't believe Jackie had taken an active role in Ben's disappearance. She probably had an idea of what was going on, and Abby still firmly believed her mother knew that Ben was okay, but she couldn't imagine Jackie actually kidnapping and hiding her own son. Besides, her mother was right, it had been a long day, and she was tired.