Cracks in the Sidewalk (34 page)

“What about mail?” he asked. “Do you have a forwarding address?”

Fran shook her head again. “Sorry. I just give it back to the postman and say he doesn’t live here anymore.” She saw the look of distress on their faces and added, “But I’ll bet the post office has a forwarding address, because he still gets a lot of bills coming to this address.”

“Thanks,” Charlie said. Then he turned and walked away with Claire, who was too tearful to say anything.

~ ~ ~

T
he following day the search for Jeffrey began. It started at the post office with a clerk who claimed they had no forwarding address for Jeffrey Caruthers, and if they did it would be illegal to give it out to an unauthorized party.

“I can only release that information to Mister Caruthers himself,” she said.

“He already knows it!” Claire snapped.

The second stop was the Somerset Realty office. Pamela Elkins did work there, the manager said, and she had handled the sale of the Caruthers house. But she was on vacation in the Caribbean and not due back for three weeks.

“Do you have a forwarding address?” Charlie asked.

“Not in our files. It’s possible that Pamela knows the new address but—”

“I know. She’s on vacation.”

“Right.”

The next stop was Noreen Sarnoff’s office.

“We’re trying to get in touch with Jeffrey,” Charlie explained. “But apparently he has—”

“Skipped town?” Noreen said sarcastically.

“I don’t know if I’d say that,” Charlie replied diplomatically, “but he has moved. He’s sold his house and—”

“Skipped,” Noreen repeated.

Claire registered a look of alarm. “Do you know where he went?”

“If I knew where that deadbeat was, I’d be collecting what he owes me.”

“But you’re his lawyer. Don’t you have some way of contacting him?”

“Nope. He was there one day, gone the next. He never even put the proceeds of his house in the bank. He took the certified check, cashed it, and disappeared the same day.”

“Have you spoken with Pamela Elkins?”

“Yeah. She knows something, but she’s got a serious case of lip-lock. Whatever she does know, she’s not going to tell.”

“And there’s no other way to find him?” Charlie asked.

“Through friends possibly or family. They won’t talk to me, but they might be willing to tell you where he is. Other than that…” Noreen spread her hands in a gesture of helplessness.

“What about the court?” Claire asked. “Doesn’t he have to tell them—”

“Unfortunately not. He’s got sole custody of the kids, so he can take them anywhere he pleases without telling anyone.”

Claire groaned. “They’re our grandchildren. We’ve got to find them.”

“You might try hiring a private investigator, but you’d probably be wasting your money. When somebody like Jeffrey decides to disappear, it’s pretty hard to find them. And even if you do, you still can’t make him let you visit the kids.”

A stream of tears started to come from Claire’s eyes. “Those children are all we have left of Elizabeth. We’ve got to find them.”

“We will,” Charlie promised. “We will.” He put his arm around her and together they left the office, both of them hunched over with sadness draped across their shoulders.

Searching

F
or two weeks Claire remained in bed. In the morning she’d wake, remember she’d lost her grandchildren along with Elizabeth, and then drop back onto the pillow.

“Why bother?” she’d moan. “There’s nothing to get up for.”

The telephone went unanswered, uncollected mail jammed the mailbox, a thick layer of dust settled on tabletops, and Charlie went back to eating his dinner at the diner.

On Sunday he tried to coax her into going to church.

“The Lord’s not interested in hearing from me,” she said and turned toward the wall. When Charlie argued such a thing wasn’t true, she rattled off a list of prayers that hadn’t been answered.

“What about those? If He was listening, would He have let me lose Liz and then lose my grandbabies too?”

Charlie tried to remind her the Lord moves in ways we don’t always understand, but Claire’s ears closed tighter than her eyes. Finally he went to church alone.

“Where’s Claire?” Pastor Tom asked. Charlie simply said she didn’t feel well.

Mildred sauntered over. Mildred had known Claire since grade school, knew Claire inside and out, better perhaps than Charlie.

“Is Claire still home feeling sorry for herself?”

Charlie gave a sheepish grin. “She’s a bit under the weather.”

“Baloney! She’s not sick. She’s just feeling sorry for herself. I stopped by three times last week, but she wouldn’t open the door. I’m her best friend, and she won’t open the door!”

With a weary nod of his head, Charlie sighed. “It’s not you, Mildred. Claire won’t talk to anyone these days. She’s crawled into a shell and she—”

“She doesn’t need you feeling sorry for her, what she needs is somebody to drag her butt out of that bed!”

“As depressed as she is, I hardly think it would help for me—”

“Well, I’d do it if she’d open the door!”

When Charlie left for work Monday morning, the front door of the McDermott house was left unlocked.

Shortly after ten o’clock, Claire heard the doorbell chime but she remained in bed and tugged the covers up around her ears. The chime rang a second time and then a third. After that she heard the front door open and footsteps tromp up the stairs.

Fear slid through Claire’s chest as she nervously called out, “Who’s there?”

“Me,” Mildred said, barreling through the bedroom door.

“How did you—”

“The door was open, so I figured you must’ve left it open for me.”

“As you can see, I’m not up to having company.” Claire dropped her head back onto the pile of pillows.

“What I see is a woman feeling sorry for herself for no good reason.”

“I have a reason,” Claire said defensively, then launched into the story of how Jeffrey had disappeared, taking her grandchildren with him.

“And you figure staying in bed is better than looking for them?” Mildred asked sarcastically.

“Did you not hear what I said?” Claire replied. “No one knows where they’ve gone!”

Mildred plopped down on the bed. “And you’re willing to accept that without looking any further?”

“Where else can I look?”

“David’s in first grade, so try checking the school. Ask some of the neighbors. You said Jeffrey had a girlfriend, try finding her. Go see Jeffrey’s parents. Anything is better than lying here like a lump. You’re so busy feeling sorry for yourself you haven’t thought about anybody else. What if the kids are someplace they don’t want to be? What if they’re waiting for Grandma to find them?”

When Claire gave no answer Mildred said, “I guess they’ll have to keep waiting, because Grandma is busy wallowing in self-pity!”

“I am not,” Claire argued.

“Then prove it. Get out of that bed.”

“I told you, I’m not well.”

“Okay, I’ll take you to the doctor.”

“I’m not
that
sick.”

“Then get dressed, and we’ll start trying to find those kids!”

The thought of finding her missing grandchildren pried Claire from the bed. Then the two old friends set off on a mission.

Their first stop was David’s elementary school where the records clerk assured them she had no knowledge of the children’s whereabouts.

“Mister Caruthers picked up David’s records himself,” she said. “He didn’t give any indication of what school David would be transferring to.”

“If you hear anything—” Claire said.

“I doubt we will,” the clerk replied, “and even if we did, that information is restricted. The law prohibits our releasing it to just anybody.”

“I’m not anybody, I’m his grandmother!”

“That may be,” the clerk replied, “but if Mister Caruthers wanted you to know where David is, I think he would have told you.”

After leaving the clerk, Claire and Mildred went in search of room 208 where Carolyn Platt taught first grade.

“We miss having David in our class,” she cooed. “How is he doing in his new school?”

“I wish I knew,” Claire replied sadly. “Our son-in-law has taken all three of the children and disappeared.”

“Disappeared?”

“Completely. No forwarding address, nothing.” Claire’s eyes began to grow teary. “I was wondering if David ever mentioned where they were going.”

“No, he didn’t,” Carolyn said sympathetically. “As a matter of fact, his father pulled him out of class one day and that was that. I never even had the opportunity to say goodbye.”

That evening Claire telephoned Jeffrey’s parents in Florida.

“I understand your loyalty to your son,” she explained, “but I’m not looking to cause trouble. I’m only interested in seeing my grandchildren and—”

Before she could mention helping Jeffrey with any financial problems, the irate Emma Caruthers began screaming in her ear.

“How dare you! What audacity! You have some nerve asking for my help after all the hateful things your family has done to my boy!”

“We’ve never done—”

“Don’t think you can lie to me! Jeffrey’s told me all about you and that miserly husband of yours!”

“I’m afraid you’ve been misinformed, Charlie actually helped Jeffrey to—”

“To drive him out of business! That’s what he helped do!”

“Maybe we can make things right with Jeffrey,” Claire said, sounding conciliatory. “If you could just give me his new address—”

Emma screamed, “Hell will freeze over first!”

~ ~ ~

N
o stone was left unturned in the search for the Caruthers family. Charlie spoke with banking associates and fellow members of the Chamber of Commerce, tactfully inquiring whether anyone had heard from Jeffrey or knew of his whereabouts. The answer was always a shake of the head. Claire and Mildred bundled themselves in sweaters and tromped up and down the streets questioning neighbors and conversing with children at play in hopes of finding David and Kimberly’s new address.

Shortly after Thanksgiving the weather became blustery, playgrounds emptied out, and the last vestige of leaves disappeared from trees, but still there was no word of David, Kimberly, or Christian. When the frosty winds of December drove everyone inside Claire made telephone calls. She called the children’s dentist, their pediatrician, even a children’s wear shop on the far side of Union, but the answer was always the same. No one, it seemed, knew anything. The family had simply vanished.

Although Claire grew teary-eyed at the mere mention of grandchildren she clung to a thread of hope and followed every imaginable lead, none of which proved successful.

Then on a day when the wind rattled windows and upended garbage cans Louise Farley, a frail wisp of a woman well into her eighties, came knocking at the door.

“What are you doing out in this weather?” Claire said as she tugged the tiny woman inside.

“I came to ask a favor,” Louise said in spurts, trying to catch her breath.

Claire took hold of her arm. “First sit down and have a cup of tea. You’ve no business being out in this weather.”

Still shivering, Louise said, “This isn’t so bad. In Minnesota over Thanksgiving it was so cold my bones nearly froze.”

“Minnesota?” Claire said. “What in the world were you doing in Minnesota?”

“Visiting my sister, Clovis. Minnesota’s a nice enough place but way too cold for the likes of me.” Louise wrapped her bony fingers around the steaming cup of tea. “When you and Charlie go out there be sure to bring plenty of warm clothes, because you’re gonna need them!”

Claire laughed. “Oh, I doubt we’ll be going to Minnesota.”

“You’re not planning to visit the grandchildren?”

“You mean our grandchildren?” Claire asked.  

“Yes,” Louise answered, “David, Kimberly, and the little one—what’s his name?”

“Christian.”

“Yes, that’s it, Christian.”

Claire felt her heart jump. “You know where they live?”

“Not really. But they were at the Minnesota State fair when I saw Clovis in the fall, so I’d guess somewhere in Southern Minnesota or maybe Wisconsin.”

Claire gasped. “You’ve seen them?”

“Not since September.”

“Where?”

“The Minnesota State Fair,” Louise repeated. “It’s quite an event. There’s livestock shows, a big Ferris wheel, kiddie rides, and every kind of food imaginable, even fried cheese. Can you believe—”

“You saw Liz’s kids? Our grandchildren?” Claire asked again.

“Oh, yes. They were there, all three of them. They were with their daddy and some girl who looked to be half his age. David, he saw me before I saw him. He started waving and calling out ‘Hi, Miss Louise,’ but that girl yanked him and Kimberly away before I got a chance to talk to them.” The old woman’s face wrinkled with disdain. “That girl looked like a trashy sort.”

Claire peppered Louise with question after question but got few answers. Yes, she had seen the kids. Yes, they all looked well. No, she hadn’t had an opportunity to talk to them. No, she hadn’t trailed them back to wherever they were living.

“It never dawned on me to do that; I didn’t know they’d gone missing.”

After nearly two hours of questioning, Louise finally got to the favor she’d come to ask about. “I was hoping you’d be willing to help me with my Sunday school class for the next six weeks.”

Caught up in the euphoria of good news, Claire answered, “Sure.”

~ ~ ~

T
hat night Claire told Charlie of the conversation.

“Now that we know they’re in Minnesota, we can get a private investigator to find them,” Claire said.

Although he argued that trying to find five people who lived somewhere
in the state of Minnesota or perhaps Wisconsin was like searching for a needle in a haystack, Charlie finally agreed to hire an investigator.

“But even if we get Jeffrey’s address, it doesn’t mean he’ll allow us to visit the kids.”

Claire didn’t want to consider such a negative train of thought, so for the remainder of the month she happily planned their reunion with the children.