HIGHWATER: a suspense thriller you won't be able to put down (22 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

“Do you know this boy?” Tom stood just outside the recovery room on the pediatrics floor. The child who’d greeted the Goldfine girl stood just in front of him, on the threshold. Elizabeth, sitting in the chair next to Caleb’s bed, only looked at Tom.

The police were coming. Down below, the sirens had wailed and then cut off.

Tom looked at the parents, children, nurses, doctors, interns, residents, orderlies. They all stood around with their eyes wide and watchful. The other four boys still stood in the same places.

The TV up high in the corner of the nurses station showed news channel footage of Lake Champlain, a reporter walked along the shoreline, pointing and talking. Tom glanced away and at last looked at the coins taped to the door of Caleb’s room.

The elevator door opened and a security guard got out, followed by a cluster of police. The embarrassed-looking security guard and the police eyed the boys. Then the security guard saw Tom, looked at Tom’s gun, and marched over. He was followed by one of the Burlington cops.

“I didn’t see them. They got past me. What’s going on? What are they doing?” The security guard was a barrel-chested fellow whose uniform looked too tight. He had dark, pock-marked skin and a bushy black mustache. He smelled faintly of aftershave and dust.

Tom shook his head. “I don’t know.”

The cop stepped forward. “Sergeant Mahoney,” he said.

Tom shook the cop’s hand.

Mahoney surveyed the kids. Then he glanced at the door and at the coins taped up there. Finally he looked at the eleven or twelve-year-old boy who was facing into the room.

“Son,” said the sergeant. “Son, turn around please.”

Mahoney held up his hand, palm-outward. The Burlington cops each sidled up to one of the boys and stood by him. It struck Tom as absurd, as some sort of parlor game, something choreographed. He could imagine a curtain suddenly lifting and all of them, the hospital staff, the patients, the police, all starting to sing and dance, the orderly pushing his mop around and waltzing with it, the residents with their clipboards held to their chests stepping to the front of the stage and singing in boisterous unison, their mouths open in wide “O’s”. Only the boys, Tom thought, would be standing still, as they were now, as the whole musical routine went on around them.

Of course the security guard hadn’t noticed them, he thought, they’re magicians
. Now you see them, now you don’t
.

Mahoney addressed the boy in the doorway. “What business do you have here? Do you have family here?”

The boy didn’t turn around or acknowledge that he was being spoken to.

Tom was suddenly sure that the child’s behavior wasn’t insolence or stubbornness. It wasn’t exhibitionism, either; the boy was simply not aware that the sergeant existed. Or that any of the people on the pediatrics floor did, for that matter. Only the baby boy in the room existed, and maybe the girl, too.

“Son!” the sergeant yelled, and Tom put a hand out to stop him, considering whether to share his thoughts with him, but, to his surprise, the Goldfine girl spoke up first.

“He can’t understand you. Please don’t get mad at him. He doesn’t mean to ignore you.”

Tom gaped at her, his hand still out in front of the sergeant, hovering there. The sergeant pushed Tom’s hand roughly aside. “Is he deaf?”

Tom observed Elizabeth closely. She seemed to recognize the same thing he did. In a time-to-fish-or-cut-bait kind of way, you might say.

“No,” she said, “he’s not deaf.”

The child stirred in the bed. They all watched, everything else suddenly forgotten. Tom sensed the others behind him — some of the staff, some of the patients and visitors, the burly security guard. All were crowding around and peering into the recovery room.

Caleb let out a mewl, like he might cry, and everyone seemed to hold their breath. Then his eyes blinked open, and Caleb looked around. The Goldfine girl watched him, and Tom watched her, looking, perhaps, for those things that the doctors and nurses and CPS agents had been looking for: signs of a maternal connection.

And then he saw it.

As the child sat up in bed, rubbing his eyes, Caleb pulled out the pacifier Liz had given him. He looked at it, as if trying to figure out what it was. The expression on his face, the shape of his eyes, his brow, the way his mouth turned down slightly at the corners, it all came together. They had been in separate rooms at the Red Rock Medical Center. They had been transported to Fletcher Allen in separate ambulances. Tom hadn’t been allowed in the room during the transfusion and surgery the child had undergone. This was the first time he had seen the two of them together. And, he thought, there was really no question. Caleb was the spitting image of the woman sitting next to him. The Goldfine girl was his mother. And, not only that, Tom thought, watching the child’s every move, every tic, every dart of the eye, he looked like someone else as well. Yes, there was no mistaking the way his eyebrows arched as the child observed the group huddling in the doorway, no question as to the resemblance of the down-turned mouth which now twitched into a kind of sly, endearing smile. The boy looked just like a young man Tom had given refuge to the night before. He was a miniature version of Christopher.

“Hey!” someone yelled.

Tom saw that the young boys were moving again, walking toward the room. Three of the four police offers were holding them by the shoulders, the fourth seemed unsure of what to do, of whether or not the use of force was appropriate for boys this age. Tom stepped past the gaggle of onlookers crowded around the door and said, “It’s okay, it’s okay. Let them through.”

“Wait a minute,” said Sergeant Mahoney. “We haven’t searched them.”

“We can’t let them through,” said the security guard with the moustache.

“It’s okay,” Tom said again in his best soothing-and-persuading tone. “Just let them through.”

“Hey,” said Mahoney, “New York,” he called Tom, “this is my city, okay?”

Tom shifted a little and stood toe-to-toe with the sergeant, a man perhaps ten years younger than Tom was. Tom was close enough to smell coffee on the man’s breath, and, perhaps, a trace of Bailey’s Irish Cream.

“Let’s just see what they do, okay? You and your boys are plenty bigger than these kids are. If anything happens, I’m sure it’ll be no problem to escort them out.”

The sergeant’s blue eyes, crisscrossed with a filigree of red, flicked back and forth across Tom’s face. Then, still looking at Tom, he said, “Let them through.”

“Thank you,” said Tom, and stepped away.

The elevator dinged. About fifteen people were crowded inside, all with that wide-eyed, expectant look on their faces.
Spectators
, thought Tom,
coming to see what all the fuss is about
.

“Keep them back,” he said quietly to Mahoney, who passed the order on to his officers.

Meanwhile, the other boys joined the one at the door. Tom noticed that the onlookers were stepping back to give them room, as though they felt they were witnessing something that needed to unfold unhindered, or maybe to avoid something contagious, some kind of contamination.

The boys filed in behind the first one, standing there at the edge of the room. As soon as they were lined up, the first boy took a step and entered. The others followed him in.

Tom peered around the edge of the door and watched the Goldfine girl. She seemed unafraid. Nevertheless, Tom still gripped his .38, and he saw in his peripheral vision that Sergeant Mahoney had a hand resting on his own firearm, still in its holster, snapped closed.

The boys, moving neatly together, fanned out and surrounded Caleb’s bed. Tom felt Mahoney bristle beside him. The sergeant pushed closer to the door, moving in front of a woman in a white smock.

“Okay,” Tom whispered, “okay . . .”

The group in the doorway were absolutely still now that Mahoney had his spot in front. Tom looked at the boys. He half expected them to do something cultish, such as link arms and bow heads and start chanting. He thought of Jim Jones. Tom had still been a young man when the Jonestown Massacre had been front page news. He’d been wary of organized religions of any kind since. He had predicted the disastrous end to the Waco siege from the very beginning. It was amazing, Tom thought, how quickly people forgot.

But the boys didn’t do anything overtly cultish. They attended the bed, attended the boy, Caleb, giving him their direct attention as he looked from face to face, his red pacifier held in one small hand. And then the little child spoke.

“
Gracias para venir
,” said the child in a high, sweet voice.

The crowd at the door murmured. Mahoney leaned back and asked Tom, “Spanish?” Tom nodded.

Tom looked down, searching the floor, and thought. Then he looked back up and into the room.

“
Quien es ustedes
?” Tom asked.
Who are you?
He thought that was right.

The boys turned outward from their circle around the bed. They all looked at Tom. Mahoney twitched, and Tom heard him unsnap his holster.

The one closest to Tom blinked.

“
Somos
Atman,” he said.

We are Atman.

We are everything.

“
Nosotros Somos vuestros siervos
,” said another.

We are your servants.

“
Sus ángeles
.”

Your angels.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

The hubbub from the crowd at the door grew louder. Tom looked at the young woman with the glasses and clipboard, Sophie, and said, “I need to talk to the girl, in private. Where can we go?”

“You can use our break room, I guess,” replied the young woman.

“Okay,” said Tom, and touched Mahoney’s shoulder. “Can you get these people to disperse? I need to talk to the girl.”

Mahoney looked at Tom, considering his request, and then offered a curt nod. He addressed the group of cops and spectators. “Okay, people. Let’s all go back about our business. Young and Javitz, I need you here, at this door, right here, nobody comes in.”

“You have to admit the doctors,” said a good-looking man dressed in white. There was petulance in his tone. The other people were already being ushered away by the police officers.

“We’ll see,” said Mahoney.

Tom stepped in to the room. He looked at the Goldfine girl, already getting up from her chair. She had a look of resignation about her.

“Elizabeth. Let’s go.”

She stood up and looked at the child in the bed. Then she looked at the boys surrounding him and decided something. Caleb smiled brightly at her, and then his face crumpled and he looked as though he might cry.

“I’ll be right back,” she said to him.

“Okay,” he said in that little voice, and then he started to cry after all.

Elizabeth looked over at Tom. “I . . .” she began, and Tom was sure she was going to say
I can’t leave him again
, but then one of the boys began to recite something.

“Here is the alligator, sitting on the log,” he said in what sounded like a Spanish accent. “Down in the pond, he sees a little frog.”

Mahoney turned and listened. So did Sophie and the handsome doctor. Others tried to turn back to see what was going on, but the officers kept them moving away. Tom heard a little girl, the one he had seen before, arguing with her mother. The orderly stood nearby, a tub full of bottles in his hands. The boy at Caleb’s bed continued:

“
In
jumps the alligator . . .”

Caleb had stopped crying and was looking at the boy. Caleb’s face was slicked with fresh tears, but he was smiling again.

“The log spins round . . . round. . .” said the boy, revolving his skinny forearms around one another, his shock of black hair jiggling. “And away swims the frog.”

Another boy began a nursery rhyme, and Elizabeth finally went over to Tom.

“Follow me,” he said.

He turned to Sophie. “Lead the way, Miss.”

Sophie, her clipboard grasped to her chest, wound her way through the crowd, and Tom and Elizabeth followed. Officers Young and Javitz took guard at the door, like soldiers.

***

Tom and Liz sat in the break room together. There were two round-top tables, with five chairs each, a counter with a sink and white cupboards above, a coffee maker, and a small television set. The TV was tuned to the same news channel as the one at the nurses station. The air smelled like burnt coffee.

Tom looked at Liz.

“What happened at Jared’s house?”

Liz had looked serene, almost with that same
rightfulness
Tom saw in the boys and youths. Now her expression grew pensive again.

“You’re asking me
now
? What do you mean? With Christopher?”

Tom shook his head. “Before that. With Jared. What did you see?”

She looked away, and her face grew a shade paler. “I saw people. People who . . .”

“What?”

“Well, I don’t know. They were deformed. Like carnival deformed. Worse.” Her eyes found him, and she looked exhausted, like when he’d first picked her up from the house. Her eyes were red and had a vacant look, as if she might slip away again.

“Birds,” she said.

Tom felt like someone had pinched him. “Birds? Birds were trying to get in?”

“Birds were the people.” She looked embarrassed. Then her face changed again. “Like demons.”

Milliner was silent.

She blinked several times, as if coming out of something. “Why?”

“You think these boys in there are dangerous? Like the ones . . . the things you saw?”

“No,” she said right away, shaking her head. She looked down. Tom thought he saw a slight smile in her lips. “They’re the other ones.”

“The other ones.”

“The wagerers. Servants, like they said.”

“I thought those were the older boys.”

She shrugged.

This got Milliner going again. “Because Jared thinks that rabid coyotes were trying to get in to your house. And a cop friend of mine thinks that Jared has been . . . hurting young women.”

“What?” Her eyes widened. “No. Jared’s not . . . no. I don’t understand.”

Tom leaned back and ran a hand over his scalp. Then he leaned forward, putting his forearms on the table, interlacing his fingers.

“Elizabeth, I’m going to level with you. We don’t have much more time here. I’ve got to get you back, or they’re going to send federal officers after you. After me, too. Now, there are a lot of nice things going on. What you have done for the baby, Caleb, is wonderful. And he generally seems to be doing well now that you’re around.”

Tom scratched at his chin, trying to find the right way to proceed.

“We seem to be . . . well, something seems to be looking out for us, doesn’t it? We were sort of ushered away from the other hospital. Brought here instead. Something looking out for us wanted to get us away from Red Rock. Doesn’t it feel that way?”

It took her a moment, either to process or accept, Tom wasn’t sure.

“Yes.”

“Like these boys, those young men, these happenings, all of it. Trying to help us. To steer us away from danger. But we can’t be sure.”

“What danger?”

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out. But whatever it is, I think it has something to do with the Kingston place. With Jared’s house.”

“I’ve had dreams,” she said quickly. She stared off over his shoulder.

“Oh yeah?”

She nodded. He waited for her to say more, but she only pointed and said, “Look. That’s home, isn’t it?”

Liz was referring to the TV. Tom turned around. He watched a man who looked familiar mouthing silent words towards the camera. A name appeared below him. It read: DEC CSI Ranger Andy Gramone.

Tom stood up. He looked around on the TV for a volume control.

“Where is it? Where’s the volume?”

“Look along the bottom, under the screen.” Liz’s voice sounded far away.

Tom found the dial for the volume and turned it up. Gramone was in mid-sentence.

“—which is my job. The hydraulic fracturing process creates what are basically like mini-earthquakes. A blast of water with a stew of chemicals shoots down into the earth, and blasts around in there to try and bring up the natural gas. I’m not saying we know that this is exactly the cause of the highwater. But it is possible that drilling in the Marcellus Shale, which doesn’t reach this far north, has still released some deep aquifers we didn’t know about, and that might be what’s creating a kind of watershed and feeding into the Adirondack systems. The water table has risen dramatically, that’s what we know. And there could be natural gas contamination.”

They watched as Gramone turned and swept his arm over the scenery behind him, which included a body of water Tom recognized as Lake Colden, right near the Red Rock Medical Center.

“And it keeps rising,” said Gramone. “It’s officially highwater.”

The story cut back to the anchor as Tom’s cell phone rang. It was such a coincidence that for a moment, Tom thought that the news anchor, a pretty blonde, was the one with the ringing phone, absurd as that notion was. Then he looked down at his coat and fished the phone out of his pocket.

“Tom Milliner,” he answered.

“Tom,” the voice on the other end was out of breath, but Tom recognized it at once. It was Jim Cruickshand again.

“Jim,” said Tom.

“Sorry about before. I, uh, hadn’t slept.” His voice sounded pained.

“It’s okay, Jim.” Tom walked across the small break-room to the door. He held up a finger to Liz, who nodded.

“Jim, what’s wrong? You sound like you’re having trouble breathing.”

“No, not having trouble . . . fine.” The connection was patchy at best. Tom wasn’t sure whose end the disruption was on.

“—the girl?”

“What?”

“Do you have the girl?” Jim said the words slowly and deliberate.

Tom hesitated. He looked at Elizabeth, who was glued to the TV. “What do you need, Jim?”

“—coming to you,” was all Tom heard.

“You’re coming here? Why?”

“The birds.” Jim’s breathing was labored. His exhalations snuffled the phone; blasts of air between his words. His tone was mixed with wonder, fear, and humor. Tom thought he heard other voices, shouts, in the distance.

“What birds? What’re you talking about?” But he looked at the girl again. Tom’s throat was dry.

“—with me,” said Jim, sounding conciliatory. It wasn’t Jim’s usual half-haughty, half-redneck aggravation. It was something else.

“What? Jim, why would you come here?”

More breathing and rustling. Tom heard a car door shut. He heard the digitally-received, scratchy
bing!
-
bing!
of keys in an ignition.

“You know why, Milliner. They’re in the trees. And tell Cruder I’m coming too.”

“Okay.” He attempted levity, “But I won’t tell her you called her that.” Jim had enjoyed making fun of Maddy’s surname since they were kids.

Tom heard the engine come to life on the other end. He thought to himself — if something was going on with Jim, if he’d snapped (which more than one person on the force had said might happen someday) then why call and announce that he was coming? Tom guessed it was a cry for help. That Jim, any sane part of Jim still in operation, was warning Tom. Preparing him. Jim was an asshole, always had been, but he had his good moments — Tom had witnessed them. Jim’s dad was a terrible gin drinker who had kept his own concoction in mason jars in the basement of the Cruickshand family home, dozens and dozens of them — fifty gallons worth it was found when he’d been first taken to the hospital. Jim’s dad was an active drunk, but Jim wasn’t. He’d spent most of his life avoiding the drink, Tom knew, but sometimes that could wear a man down, consistently withstanding temptation.

“Jim, what are you doing?”

“Something I should have done a long time ago.”

“What’s that supposed to mean? What should you have done a long time ago?”

Tom heard the ticking of what could’ve been a turn signal blinking. Then the flick of a lighter. The signal was crystal clear for a few moments. Tom realized that the problem wasn’t his location, but Jim moving in and out of patchy spots of reception.

“Anyway, I’m sorry I got so pissed off earlier. I don’t know what . . .”

Either he trailed off or was clipped off by the connection.

“Jim?”

“—kids coming back with blown-off parts. It’s as bad as the theater of ’Nam, Tommy, you know that, I know that. Let’s just say it. Did you know three ’Nam vets have committed suicide for every soldier who died in combat?”

Tom felt a chill. Not because of Jim’s words, but because he suddenly felt like he was back in high school. Like he was standing on the smoker’s path behind the school grounds. A shortcut through the woods down to Dorsey Street on the other side, where Tom and Jim had smoked their first Marlboro together, when Vietnam had been brewing.

“I didn’t know that.”

“And these girls,” Jim was saying. “These young girls . . . you know, I don’t like what comes over me, Tommy.” His voice was different now, it was higher, emotional; a quality Tom had rarely heard in Jim’s voice, even at his father’s funeral. But the moment was soon gone, and that agitation, injustice, and anger returned, discernible even over the bad connection.

Tom suddenly thought of the recent visitors, and wondered why he had yanked the girl out of the recovery room, away from those boys in their clothes harkening back to the stock market crash of 1929. Standing around the child’s bed, reciting nursery rhymes in Spanish accents.

Tom felt the back of his neck getting warm, a sensation he got when he was being watched, but when he looked, the girl was still gazing at the TV. His hands clammy, he shifted the phone from one ear to the other and leaned into it, tucking over at the waist, whispering.

“Listen to me, Jim. Turn around. Do not come here. You’re unstable right now, and you know it. Go back home, get some rest. I’ll call you in the morning and fill you in.”

“—happen,” said Jim.

Tom had a thought. “What happened to the Kingston kid? Where is he?”

“—et him, too,” was all Tom heard. Then: “We got soft, Tommy.”