Stolen in the Night (10 page)

“Mom?”

Tess jumped and let out a soft cry.

“It’s just me,” said Erny, delighted with her alarmed response.

“You scared me. I thought you were asleep,” she said.

“Nah. I was waiting until you got back.”

“Well, I’m back,” she said firmly. “Now you can sleep. Did you have a good time at
your aunt and uncle’s?”

“Pretty good. Ma, I’m sorry I said those things to you. I shouldn’t have said you
were lying. I didn’t mean it.”

“I know, honey. Don’t worry about it. We’re all a little stressed.”

“What did the police chief say?”

Tess was not about to utter the accusation against Rob DeGraff, the grandfather Erny
had never known. “We just went over the same stuff. He thinks I must have…remembered
the wrong man.

“Did you?” he asked. “Did you remember the wrong guy?”

Tess sighed. “I don’t think I did. I saw the man who took her. But it’s a problem
because the test results say someone else did the…crime.”

Erny was silent for a minute. “Maybe it was his friend. Maybe his friend dared him
to take her.”

It seemed like an utter non sequitur. “His friend? What friend?”

“I don’t know. Any friend. Your friends can get you into trouble sometimes,” he said
in a knowing tone.

Tess turned over in her bed and propped herself up on one elbow. She could see the
other bed, the jumble of Erny’s covers, and his shock of dark hair against the pillow
in the moonlight.

“What do you mean?” said Tess.

“Oh, you know, Ma. Sometimes they say, ‘Let’s do something bad,’ and you might not
even want to do it. But you do it anyway.”

Tess’s heart skipped a beat. She knew he was speaking from experience. And any other
night, she would have pursued his explanation, but tonight all she could think about
was the possibility he raised. “That’s true,” said Tess slowly. Julie said that Lazarus
had had no friends, but that wasn’t necessarily true. Maybe if she knew more about
his life…. Erny yawned while Tess turned the idea over and over in her mind. Then
she said aloud, “But no. Wait. It couldn’t be.”

“What couldn’t?” Erny murmured. Sleep was beginning to overtake him.

“If someone else did the…crime,” said Tess, thinking aloud, “Lazarus would have told
the police. Why would he take the blame?”

“He didn’t want to be a snitch,” said Erny, as if that were the most reasonable explanation
in the world.

No, of course not. Tess was silent. A partner in crime. The thought opened up a realm
of evil possibilities, like a deadly nightshade blooming in the dark. It would explain
how she could have seen Lazarus and yet the rape, and possibly the murder, was committed
by someone else. Maybe someone else had planned the whole thing. Goaded him into it.
Lazarus never could have been the brains behind it. It had to be someone older or
smarter. Someone he would be afraid to betray.

Tess looked over at her son in the dark, amazed by his simple suggestion. “You know,
honey, you might be right.”

But Erny had not heard her. He had flopped over on his side and was making a murmuring,
sighing sound. Soughing like the wind. Dreaming.

T
he next morning dawned sunny and warm, a moment of Indian summer. Dawn had opened
the sitting room windows a few inches to air out the inn a little bit. Tess pulled
back the curtain and felt the light, fresh air as she looked out at the inn’s wide
driveway. Tess noticed that the corps of reporters had thinned out a bit. The public’s
appetite for sensational news stories was insatiable, but their attention span seemed
to be ever diminishing. Thank heaven, Tess thought. The fewer developments there were
to report, the sooner the reporters would vanish. Those who remained were now assembling
outside in a desultory fashion.

As she looked out the window, Tess saw Jake’s white van, flanked on both sides and
across the top with closed extension ladders, pull up at the end of the walkway to
the front door.

“Erny,” she called out. “Uncle Jake’s here.”

The front door opened and Jake came into the vestibule “Hey, Tess,” he said. “Is the
kid ready?”

“He’s getting his stuff,” she said.

“What happened with Bosworth?” he asked.

Looking at Jake, Tess thought of the chief’s suggestion that their father might have
been her sister’s assailant. It made her feel sick to her stomach. She did not want
to imagine Jake’s reaction if he heard about this theory that the chief had posited.
“Nothing. Really. It was a complete waste of time. Where are you two headed today?”

“I’m gonna take him out to the Whitman farm. It’s a great place for a kid to run around.
He can go exploring while I finish the trim on those third-floor windows.”

Erny appeared in the hallway wearing his sweatshirt and tugging Leo by his leash.

Jake frowned at the sight of the dog.

“You said I could bring him,” Erny reminded him.

Jake shook his head. “I did? I must have been drinking. All right. Come on. See ya
later, Tess.”

“Have fun,” she said to Erny.

As soon as they were out of sight, Tess picked up her bag and pulled her own jacket
from the hook in the hallway. She drew in a deep breath to try to calm her jittery
stomach. She told herself she was going to sail past those reporters as if they were
invisible. She couldn’t hide inside this morning. Erny’s sleepy suggestion about a
friend had given her an idea and she needed to pursue it. She kept her gaze straight
ahead as the reporters, galvanized by the sight of her, began to shout out her name.

Ironically, unlike the Stone Hill Inn, the offices of the
Stone Hill Record
were subdued. A receptionist greeted Tess with a pleasant nonchalance when she asked
to see Channing Morris. “Who shall I say is asking?” the receptionist asked politely.
It was only when Tess said her name that the girl’s eyes widened and she rang the
publishers office and spoke in a low, hurried voice.

She hung up the receiver and looked up at Tess. “He’ll be out in just a minute. You
can have a seat,” she said, indicating the waiting area of the newspaper’s modest
office. Tess thanked her and walked over to the low-slung leather couch that sat beneath
a wall of framed photos. They told a story in pictures of the newspaper’s history.
Most were photos of men dressed in banker’s-style suits, shaking one another’s hands
and beaming avuncularly. The exception was a stern, square-jawed woman with snapping
black eyes who was in the center of many of the pictures. Tess was studying the gallery
when Chan Morris, handsome and casual-looking in an open-collared shirt, his hands
stuffed into the pockets of his well-worn chinos, emerged into the waiting area.

“Miss DeGraff,” he said. “You looking at my journalistic forebears there?”

Tess nodded. “You had a female publisher, I see.”

“My grandmother,” said Chan.

“Wow. Looks like she was kind of a feminist pioneer,” said Tess.

“Oh yeah. No knitting and cookie baking for her. She was as tough as nails. But she
taught me the newspaper business.”

Tess smiled. “I guess you didn’t have much choice.”

Chan shrugged. “Luckily, I liked it. So, what brings you here? I thought you were
avoiding the media entirely.”

“I am. I was,” Tess admitted. “But I need a favor.”

“Come through,” he said. “Tell me what I can do for you.”

She followed him back into the paper’s warren of offices. “I want to look at all the
articles from the paper concerning my sister’s abduction. I need the local viewpoint.
I looked on the Interet, but you’re only catalogued for the last five years.”

“I know,” said Chan sheepishly. “It’s been a nightmare with all the news organizations
covering this story.”

“Are the back issues available?” Tess asked.

“Down these stairs,” said Chan, indicating a basement staircase. “We have them in
the archives. It’s a nuisance to look through them, but yes, we do have them.” Chan
raked his fingers through his soft black hair. “Perhaps we can help each other out.
How about just a few words of reaction from you about all this?”

“I’d rather not say too much,” said Tess.

Ignoring her reluctance, Chan reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a small
spiral-topped pad and a pen. “Just tell me how you felt when you heard the governor’s
announcement?”

Tess took a deep breath. “Shocked,” she said truthfully.

Chan scribbled on the pad. “You didn’t have any doubts, all these years.”

“I believed,” she said carefully, “that the courts and the police had done their jobs.
That the matter was settled.”

“And now?”

“And now…it would seem that the case has to be reopened.”

Chan wrote down her response and looked at her quizzically. “You sound very detached,”
he said. “Almost as if it wasn’t personal.”

“Oh, it’s very personal,” she said. “Are you finished?”

“One more question? If you don’t mind my asking, what are you looking for in the archives?”

Tess was not about to tell him her “accomplice” theory. She did not want people to
know that her search was motivated by the hunch of her ten-year-old son. She managed
a vague excuse. “Well, naturally, I have questions and I am looking for answers. Not
that I think I can find what the police couldn’t, but I have to at least see if I
can find something to jog my memory. Just for my own peace of mind.”

“Jog your memory about that night,” he said.

“Yes, exactly,” she said. “Can I have a look now?”

“Sure.” He seemed to accept her motive. He replaced his pad in his pocket and led
the way toward the basement staircase. It crossed Tess’s mind, as she accompanied
him down the steps, that he wasn’t a very aggressive reporter. They came out into
a room that looked like a low-ceilinged library, lined with shelves, which were piled
high with papers. Tess frowned, looking at the towers of papers around her. She had
expected microfilm, at least.

Chan saw her expression of dismay. “Sorry…I just don’t have the manpower to get these
back issues catalogued.”

“How do you find anything?” she asked.

Chan sighed. “It takes a while. Uh, the years you want would be over in that far corner,”
he said.

Tess sneezed.

“Dust,” he said apologetically.

“It’s okay,” she said.

“There’s a Xerox machine over there, if you want a copy of anything.”

“Thanks, I’ll be fine,” said Tess. She followed the dates on the shelves and found
the section where the papers she wanted to look at might be. She took the first sheaf
over to a small table at the end of a stack and sat down.

“Mind if we get a photo of you looking through the archives?” Chan asked.

Tess felt frozen inside, but she nodded politely. It was the price she had to pay.
“Go ahead,” she said.

“I’ll see if we’ve got a photographer in the house,” he said and he sprinted back
up the stairs, wanting to catch her before she got away.

Tess began to comb through the papers. It was an arduous task, both hard on her eyes
and on her heart. She read the accounts of Lazarus’s life closely, looking for any
indication of a friend or an associate. In the process, she was forced to look past
countless pictures of her own family, dressed in forgotten clothes, looking stunned
and grief-stricken.

She was forced to stop for a moment to turn and look gravely at the camera of the
photographer Chan had found for the job. Then she returned to leafing through the
papers. She found a few items of interest among the many articles. There was an interview
with one of Lazarus’s old schoolteachers that talked about his life as a disliked
and below-average student. No mention of friends or associates. On the contrary, the
teacher was eager to label him, as so many killers were labeled in their youth, as
a loner.

There was another interview with his aunt, Rusty Bosworth’s mother, who insisted that
their family was like a Norman Rockwell portrait of Americana, and there had to be
some mistake. There was also one reporter’s account of trying to interview Nelson
Abbott, but being met with only his scorn and impatience.

It was fascinating to Tess and repulsive at the same time. She used the copier for
a few articles she thought she might want to read again, but overall she was disappointed.
No new names from Lazarus’s life emerged or caught her attention. She was about to
give up when she came across an interview with the Phalens, who had owned the Stone
Hill Inn and had taken in the DeGraffs so kindly. Obviously the reporter was grasping
at straws, trying to offer some new, human interest angle on a case that dominated
the local headlines for weeks. The article was innocuous enough. Ken and Annette Phalen
expressed sympathy for the DeGraffs and outrage at the crime. But it was the photo
that accompanied the article that caught Tess’s attention. Tess xeroxed the article
and then sat back down at the table, staring at it. Ken stood awkwardly on the front
step of the inn while Annette and their toddler, Lisa, sat on one of the benches that
flanked the front door. Lisa was struggling to get free from her mother’s grasp. Ken,
unsmiling, was slouching, his hands in his pockets, his black hair pulled back in
a messy ponytail. For a few minutes, Tess could not put a finger on why the photo
seized her attention. And then, her eyes widened. She took out her black marker pen
and began to draw on the xeroxed copy. She drew a pair of large, black-framed glasses
on Ken Phalen’s face and stared at the result, her heart racing.

Jake glanced over at his nephew, who had his forehead pressed against the window on
the passenger side of the van. Leo was sitting straight up behind them, his furry
head poking between them, panting.

“Hey, Erny, tell your friend here to stop drooling on me.”

Jake was rewarded with a smile. Erny immediately began to pet Leo’s furry ruff. “Good
dog,” he said mischieviously.

They were approaching an all-too-familiar landmark—a humble gray farmhouse sitting
on a neatly kept acre of property. Jake wondered for a minute if he would feel any
different today seeing that house, knowing what he now knew about the DNA results.

Jake could easily have changed his route to avoid passing the Abbott place and thereby
avoid being reminded of Lazarus Abbott and what had happened to Phoebe. Avoid remembering
that it was his own fault that his sister had been unprotected when Lazarus Abbott
tore open the tent and seized her. But there was no use in that. Fate, he thought,
and no use crying about it.

A black truck was approaching from the direction in which they were headed. As the
driver signaled to turn into the Abbott driveway, Jake recognized Nelson Abbott at
the wheel, wearing his John Deere hat and his customary scowl.

Part of him wanted to point the truck out to Erny and say, “Your aunt Phoebe was killed
by that man’s son.” It seemed as if the kid had a right to know that much about the
family history. Jake could imagine the kid’s silent wide-eyed stare. But he decided
against it, and, he realized with a mild feeling of anxiety, the DNA results had something
to do with his decision to remain silent.

Instead, he continued on the meandering back road until he came to the entrance to
the Whitman farm. “This is it,” he said. “This is where we’re going.” Erny looked
around as they turned down the driveway, which had been cut through acres of trees.
Jake drove up and down several hills, past forest and field, past rock gardens and
apple trees and rosebushes that were in the process of being wrapped in burlap for
the winter

“Welcome to how the other half lives, my man,” said Jake. “Quite a place, huh?”

“Yeah,” said Erny. “Who lives here?”

“A guy named Chan Morris. He lived here with his grandmother.”

“Is he a kid?” Erny asked.

“No, he’s not a kid now. He was a kid when he moved here. When his parents died. But
that was a long time ago.”

“Did they die from drugs?” Erny asked thoughtfully.

“Drugs? No,” said Jake, frowning. “I don’t know what they died of. I don’t really
remember.”

Erny turned his head and looked out the window silently.

Jake glanced at him and suddenly realized that Erny was identifying with Chan, another
child orphaned at an early age. That’s why he’d asked about the drugs—because that
was what happened to his birth mother. Jake grimaced, remembering the awkward silence
last night when Erny mentioned his birth mother and how she’d gone to jail. He flailed
around in his mind for a change of subject. Looking out on his left, he noticed the
large, algae-covered pond rippling in the breeze under the branches of some overhanging
trees.

“Damn,” said Jake in an overly loud voice. “I wish I’d remembered to bring fishing
poles. We could’ve tried fishing over there.”

“That’s okay,” said Erny, but there was disappointment in his tone.

“No, you know what? I know a better place. Remember the lake near the mountain where
we fished the last time? Well, maybe tomorrow I’ll take you over there and we’ll fish
for a little while.”

Erny looked at him. “Really?”