Plus One (17 page)

There was a slight hesitation.

“Really?”

“Really. Would you like to see my phone?”

“Why yes, I would.”

Another pause, during which I murmured, “He’s surprised Jean doesn’t have two heads.” Day Boy tightened his lips.

“Huh,” the Suit said. “You don’t see much of that. I mean, for a Smudge and a Ray to … to…”

“To love each other?” Hélène suggested crisply.

“To be married, I meant,” he said. “In any case. Well. To each his own. That’s fine, sir, Dr. Benoît. We have a Day pass at our discretion. Go ahead, enjoy yourself. Stroll around the block, soak up some sun.” The last part of the sentence was muffled, as if they were walking away from the transmitter. The door opened with a click and closed with a gentle slam.

Hélène did not offer the remaining men a seat.

“Dr. Benoît, I’m here to ask you about the Paulsen baby. My colleague, Mr. Jones—he’s just going to have a look around your apartment while we talk.”

Thursday
5:15 p.m.

The men in suits searched Hélène’s apartment but failed to find Minister Paulsen’s baby, who woke up hungry, just one floor below, but whom Day Boy successfully stalled with gentle attention until they’d left. I stole glances as he paced the room with Fitzroy, rocking him, nuzzling him, and making quiet clicking noises, like an affectionate uncle. The baby had a sweet look of unfocused bewilderment.

The Suit who interrogated Hélène, whose name was supposedly Mr. Thomas, knew that she had handled the baby in the Day nursery before he’d gone missing. He knew that the ankle bracelet said “Baby Boy Fitzroy.” He knew that Fitzroy was Hélène’s mother’s maiden name. He was full of all sorts of information, but he was as dumb as a post, the kind of guy whose good grooming and punctuality had gotten him promoted past his natural ability. Hélène was specific and accurate about when she was in contact with the infant and who was in charge of the nursery when she left. The rest of the day she was in the constant presence of the hospital staff in the ER, in a meeting with the director of emergency services, and had gone to the restroom only twice. In short, she had an alibi for nearly every minute, and he and Mr. Jones were welcome to leave now. Her sharp tongue was sort of kickass when I wasn’t on the receiving end.

Mr. Thomas reminded her of the sensitivity of the information she possessed: it was vital that the public not know about pineal destruction. “Sharing time fairly” meant keeping the Smudge population happily and healthily adjusted in their time zone. It was considered by the executive branch to be a matter of domestic security. Mr. Thomas’s mandate from his superiors was to return the Paulsen baby with no fanfare, without the public’s knowledge that he had ever been missing.

I had a sudden picture of Mr. Thomas in my head: I’d have bet anything he was the Suit who was sitting next to Mr. Paulsen at the press conference.

Mr. Thomas let Hélène know, with puffed-up importance, that he reserved the right to return, and that he was sending her a text message with his business card attached. She was to contact him at any time of the day or night if she remembered something that might help them recover the infant.

Jean returned to her apartment a moment after the men left. He announced in French that he was going downstairs and would speak with Hélène after he checked on us. On his way to the hatch, he flipped the switch of the transmitter, and the receiver hissed static, so I shut it off.

I stepped halfway into the hall and heard Hélène’s voice on the ladder. She was following Jean. Of course she was.

“Your mom, too,” I told D’Arcy.

He ushered me out with Fitzroy in his arms and closed the door. The blue vinyl bag was not something he wanted Hélène to know about, I guessed. Fitz had begun a full-on cry of hunger, and by the time we got into the kitchen, Jean was already warming up a bottle of formula, the old-fashioned way, in a pan of heated water.

“Thank you for not turning her in,” Day Boy said to Hélène, ladling Fitzroy into Jean’s waiting arms.

“How could I?” Hélène said sharply. “She was down here with you, and you would have both been arrested!”

I spoke up. “I have an idea that would allow me to take the blame for the kidnapping, return the baby to his parents, and still give me a chance to see my grandfather.” Day Boy swung around to glare at me, and for the life of me I couldn’t figure out why—why I couldn’t have a say in my own demise. Fitzroy’s cry became guttural.

“Would you mind checking the temperature of the milk?” Jean asked Hélène. When her back was turned, he gave me a pointed, nervous look.

She took the bottle out of the water, dried it with a dish towel, capped it with a nipple, shook it, and then dribbled some of the formula on her wrist. She nodded at Jean perfunctorily and handed him the bottle.

“So what is this plan?” Hélène asked me. Day Boy’s lips were pursed, Jean’s brow was furrowed. I could see that they didn’t like not knowing the script.

“Your son and the baby stay safely out of it,” I began, by way of reassurance. “But it may pose a risk to Jean. My idea is that I text the people who have my grandfather to confirm a meeting tonight after dusk. I bring a fake baby. I don’t let them touch the decoy until I’m in Poppu’s presence, until I’ve seen him with my own eyes. Meanwhile Jean leaves the real baby somewhere safe, like a church—we can agree ahead of time on which one—and I hit ‘send’ on a text that I’ve prepared in my phone, telling the police where to find the baby. Since the message will come from my phone, I’ll be the one they blame for kidnapping the Paulsens’ child.”

“Fine,” Hélène said, after only a second or two to process the explanation.

“Too many holes,” Day Boy said.

“What holes?” I asked.

“Jean might be seen dropping off the baby.”

“It sounds easier than many things I’ve done,” Jean said.

Day Boy shook his head at me. “It’s still flawed. Why would they take you to your grandfather without demanding to see the baby first?”

“I’ll agree with them ahead of time that the trade-off only happens when he and I are in the same room together.”

“You’re right, we’ll just make them pinky swear, what was I thinking?”

I frowned at his sarcasm.

He went on: “These people could just as easily grab the ‘baby,’ not let you see your Poppu, and kill you when they discover you brought a fake. They may already be planning on killing you the moment you show up. They’ll definitely kill you when they see the Paulsens on TV with their son. Who knows whether they’ll even have your grandfather with them? And if they do have him with them, what incentive do they have to show him to you, if you seem to be carrying your only leverage in your arms?”

He was right, and I could only blurt, “Well, what bright idea do you have?”

“Du calme, D’Arcy.”
Jean tried to soothe his son.

Day Boy sighed. He rubbed his forehead hard. In a moment he said, “Your plan isn’t far off, I’m sorry. It’s good that you’re bargaining to see your grandfather without having the real baby with you—I mean, it’s good strategically, and not just for the baby’s sake. Your safety depends on their believing that
only you
know where the baby is, and even then it’s not guaranteed.”

I watched little Fitzroy sucking on the bottle—the way his lips reached with such frank need around the nipple. Everything about him was fresh and new, with no artifice. A blank slate, ready to be ruined by the world.

Day Boy said, “How about this: you bring a decoy, but just to get within talking range; you preemptively announce that the real baby is in a secure place that only you know. You agree to divulge the location in a text after you’ve seen your grandfather and are a safe distance away. We can pray they understand the argument: that you’d lose your ticket to safety if you brought the real baby.”

I asked, “What if the kidnappers won’t let me leave until they confirm where Fitz is—until they go to retrieve him?” But I knew the answer: they would see that I had lied, and eventually they’d see that the Paulsens’ boy had been returned to his parents.

Day Boy shook his head, bewildered. “If there’s absolutely zero trust on both sides, how does anyone ever exchange prisoners?”

Hélène said clinically, “In the event that you are detained I hope you understand we will still return the baby.”

“It doesn’t matter,” I said, meeting her eyes. “As long as the baby is safe, and I have a chance at seeing Poppu, we’ve all got what we need.” But I couldn’t hold her gaze for long, and so I said to the floor, “I’m as good as in jail right now—how would being held captive be any different?”

“They could hurt you, that’s how,” Jean said.

Day Boy turned to Hélène and held her shoulders gently. His touch was tentative, civil. I wondered disjointedly whether the number of giant hugs Poppu wrapped me in had been weird by other families’ standards.

“You can’t return the baby until she’s safe. Her life may depend on it.”

She pulled away with a small, stiff tug. “The child cannot stay in this apartment—
my
apartment. It makes me an accomplice to have him here and I want to end that as soon as possible.”

“Je t’en prie,”
he begged in an earnest whisper. “Just until we know she’s away from them.”

Hélène said, “I can only promise to delay until I decide action is absolutely necessary.”

It was a too-carefully worded promise, but it was the best he would get.

*   *   *

The details were a matter of bargaining between mother and son over the next ten minutes. Day Boy insisted on driving me; Hélène would only accept that condition if it was daytime, so that he was legal to drive, and demanded that he drop me off no less than half a kilometer from the meeting site, whereupon I would walk the rest of the way; Day Boy would return immediately home after leaving me; I was to text Hélène the go-ahead to release the baby as soon as I was clear of the kidnappers, and turn myself in to the police, either by flagging down a squad car or by texting emergency services.

When they had reached a familial détente, Hélène went upstairs and Jean put the baby down for a nap on his bed. Day Boy and I went to his room, where I wrote a text opening negotiations with the people who had my grandfather.

As we waited for a response, Day Boy unzipped the blue bag. A layer of thick foam covered whatever was inside.

“Shh,” he said, with a sideways smile. “We’re borrowing this from Hélène.”

There was an invoice lying on top of the foam. I picked it up and read it. Whatever it was, it had cost twelve thousand dollars.

He tipped his head to read the paper alongside me. “When she discovers this missing, you’ll have to compose something for
my
tombstone.”

He lifted the top layer to reveal a giant block of foam beneath, specially designed for its contents. In the center, nested in a cutout the shape of a baby, was … a baby. Or something that looked very like a baby. It had on a diaper and a knit cap, and its mouth was eerily open. It was wrapped in a clear bag, which had the macabre effect, given how much it looked like a real infant, of making it seem dead.

“This is Premie Gort,” Day Boy said, lifting it out. “It’s a medical training patient simulator the size of a premature baby.”

“No, this is more than half the income Poppu and I earn in a year,” I corrected him, feeling certain that I couldn’t take something so valuable.

In my peripheral vision I sensed a glance from him that lasted a fraction of a second too long, and then he concentrated on the doll. I had reminded him that I was just a guttersnipe. How much money did Medical Apprentices with National Distinction make, I wondered?

“Well,” he said, “that’s because it’s pretty sophisticated. It has little veins you can catheterize, a heartbeat, fake lungs that respire; it even moves its arms and legs a bit and cries. If you program it to do those things.”

“Why does Hélène have this?”

“They’re made in Canada by her uncle’s company. She negotiated a discount for the hospital. The only reason she hasn’t delivered it is that she’s expecting a toddler, too, and she’ll be training the staff on how to use both. Normally they’re sixteen thousand dollars.”

“Oh, great,” I said. “I can’t borrow an electronic baby that costs as much as a new car.”

He removed the plastic bag, found the AC adapter, and plugged the doll in to charge it.

“Really,” I insisted, “a loaf of bread would be fine.”

“It takes an hour to charge.” It was maddening the way he ignored me when he disagreed with me. He pulled a computer tablet and stylus out of their foam cutouts. “In the meantime, I’m going to figure out how to program it, and you’re going to rest up until we hear back about your grandfather.”

Thursday
6:20 p.m.

The final text from Poppu’s captors had said simply,
Monroe Harbor, pump-out dock, 6:30 p.m
. On the global map, the pump-out dock was clearly the straightest shot into and out of the harbor—they were preparing for a quick exit if they needed it. But I didn’t understand the meeting time: sunset was at 6:40, which meant I’d be outside, fully exposed and very illegal. Why couldn’t it have been 7:00 p.m., to cloak me in comforting darkness? But the hour was not negotiable, and I consoled myself with the fact that those ten minutes of daylight were almost enough for Day Boy to get home before his curfew, which would keep him safe and go a long way toward satisfying Hélène.

When we were nearly there, on Columbus Drive passing Roosevelt Road, Day Boy glanced at me in the back seat and announced a change in plans.

“I’m dropping you off when we reach Monroe Street, just like we said. But do you know the little parking lot that’s hidden under Lake Shore Drive north of Randolph?”

I forced myself to process what he was saying. “I … think so.”

“It’s the lot for the DuSable Harbor. I’m going to park there and wait for you.”

“What?” I said, genuinely confused. I couldn’t imagine that Hélène would tolerate deviations. I looked at the robot baby in my arms. It was stiff and almost monstrous in its preanimated state, its mouth gaping. I recalled holding Fitzroy in this same position and how expressive his little face was, already full of character. I might have had a soft spot for infants if I’d lived a different life.