LOST SOULS

Bradley Bravard

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© 2023 Bradley Bravard

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission from the author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

www.thecreativelifeadventure.com

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ISBN: 978-1-7377245-4-4

1

There’s a boy. Maybe four, five years old. Runt of a kid, dirt on his face, shaggy blond hair, and dressed in rags. His hands are rough with callouses. No shoes ‘cause the old man said the boy’d need to earn them, never specifying how that would ever happen.

The stable of gray, splintering boards leans at every angle, as run-down as the kid but for different reasons. He holds reins on three horses. They only left the stable peaceful-like out of dumb luck. The same luck the kid prays for every day. Never been to church, but something inside him yearns for benevolence in the universe. He wants to plead with the horses but he's too afraid to speak, never knowing what might set them off. This kid’s like a dog that knows he’ll get kicked, only the timing’s undecided.

Hot day. No clouds. Heat distortion swirls around the land. He's never been as far as the horizon. Never known anything but this small, angry world inside the rotting split-rail fence. The poor excuse of a house, the withering produce garden, and the weather-beaten stable stocked with horses no one else wanted. The ferry carries folks back and forth across the river, but the far shore might as well be the moon for all he's ever seen of it. Trees won't even grow in this mangy patch of land, brown and sandy, packed down by the endless steps of man and beast, like God missed a spot when he parceled out the farmland.

The animals are brawny draft horses for pulling the ferry and whatever other labor the old man can hire them out for. They jerk up, rattling the buckles on the reins. They dance their feet around, reminding the kid who's boss. Sounds like the old man's yelling at him to “Get those damn stalls cleaned,” but the boy can't hear much outside the fear that whooshes like a waterfall in his head. A noise from the ferry spooks the horses, not the brightest bunch to begin with. They rear up on their hind legs, raising up like storm clouds and kicking out their feet like lightning bolts. They snort and neigh and feed off each other. Their legs are thicker than the kid's neck. The black hooves with metal shoes look like locomotive grills.

In a blink the horses are all around him. They jump and kick. He's got a vague idea of people gathering to the side but who among them cares to step in? Tears streak the dirt on his face now, crying for the help he should have got all along. His face scrunches up at the acute endpoint of life. Crying to get one honest break to be a boy instead of a slave to fear.

The boy's not conscious of this while the horses lash into him from every direction. He understands something’s wrong but could never spell it out. And that's why he cries and doesn't struggle against the end. Helpless is all he's ever known.

Soon enough, the boy’s a bloody mess to be cleaned up. The horses scatter for someone else to round up. And the bystanders idle around – more of them now, drawn by the commotion but still faceless. Not so much heartbroken about the boy but shocked by the suddenness of it. His few years were too short a time to remember and not even known by any outside his family. Even those that witnessed his death won’t carry the memories for long, not once they’ve crossed the river and gone their way to people and places they care about. Nothing to show he ever existed.

Only a shallow grave.

*****

DEPUTY GLENN HASKELL about jumped out of his skin. He banged his palms down against the wood desk.

“Lord, Glenn,” Helen said. “It's just me.”

Glenn rubbed his eyes. He looked around the office and took a deep breath to calm his nerves. There was only the phone, a lamp, and a few papers on the desk. They never generated a lot of paperwork around the office. A stop-drop-and-roll poster was taped to one wall from a statewide fire safety campaign about eight years back.

“Sorry, Helen,” he said. “Must have dozed off.”

“Well, you tell me how you sleep with your eyes wide open,” Helen said. “That's a trick I wouldn't mind for myself.”

“Eyes open?” Hadn't he been dreaming? He was grateful to wake up, either way. He'd felt like those horseshoes were digging into his own flesh.

“Don't you lose your grip on things, Glenn,” Helen said. “We can't have you and the sheriff both being indisposed.”

“No,” he said. “I'm fine.” Not altogether. His insides still rattled. He'd seen the stableboy and looked out from his eyes at the same time. The world had gone dark in his own dream at the same time he watched life turn a cold shoulder to the kid. Glenn had woken from his share of nightmares over the years. Never one while he was already awake, though.  “What can I do for you?”

Helen put on her half-framed reading glasses worn on a chain around her neck, and frowned over her own handwritten notes. Helen was well into her sixties and allowed her dark hair to show a little more gray every year. Efficiency was never part of her reputation. What with no real need for efficiency in the office and her loyalty to the sheriff, you might say she had a lock on the office assistant job.

“The lumberyard called. Bill McCutcheon works out there, he’s been there for years.”

“I remember Bill. He was a few years after me in school.”

“He never showed up yesterday. Or today. They haven't heard a word from him. His wife's his emergency contact. But they been calling out to the house and no one answers. They think she helps out part-time at the school. Kind of a teacher's aide a few hours a week.”

“Any calls from the school?”

“Schools’ll be letting out for the summer soon enough, maybe the teacher’s aides are already done for the year? I did call their house, Stanley give me the number. All I got was their answering machine. They just live further on down Grand Avenue, at Walnut.”

Glenn rolled his shoulders. Squeezed his eyes shut and took a breath.

“What's our rule on missing persons?” he asked. He stood up in slow motion, still extracting his mind from the dream. “It's three days, isn't it?”

“I'm sure I don't know,” Helen said. “I'll look it up. Have we ever had a real missing persons case? I can pull the forms, they’ll be in the filing cabinet somewhere.”

“Maybe they were in an accident. You hear anything on the scanner?”

She shook her head.

Glenn walked into the lobby. The brick building, one of the few in town, dated to the late 1800s and still had the high ceiling and most of the original wood trim. They built it as a jail until a lot of local jails were consolidated into the state prison system. Tall, skinny windows on either side of the broad wood door with warped views of the street because the glass was original. A house plant Helen had brought in years ago sagged against a corner. She swore it was supposed to be some variety of palm tree. The plant had grown taller than Glenn but never looked sincere in the effort. Helen's desk was in the middle of the office facing the door. Filing cabinets stood at ease against one wall. The county commission had talked about getting a computer system for the office, but the sheriff said they had a good five to ten years before anyone got past the thinking stage and by then the technology would have changed so much, they would have to start over. A water cooler and snack table sat in the short hallway between Glenn's office and the sheriff's. A pecan coffee cake, something Helen made extra on the weekends when she was baking for her church, showed up every Monday and diminished as the week went on. Helen made a big batch of seven-layer bars every Christmas and, every July 4th, about the best cornbread anyone had ever tasted, but it was her coffee cake that sustained the congregation and the sheriff’s office. Glenn could usually figure the day of the week by how much coffee cake was left.

“How is he?” Glenn asked over his shoulder.

“He's all right,” Helen whispered. “You can talk to him.”

Glenn tapped on the open door to the sheriff's office. “Sheriff? You got a minute?”

“Glenn, my boy, come in,” the sheriff looked up. “How are you this fine morning?”

Helen had been the sheriff’s assistant so long, Glenn could never remember which one had been in the department longer. Marvin Howard was a heavyset man with wispy hair, thick hands and features, and a complexion even paler than Glenn’s. Glenn couldn't recall meeting a more gentle man.

Helen followed Glenn into the office. It was a duplicate of Glenn's except for some state-required paperwork on one wall and a tired-looking brown sofa leaning against another.

“Care for some ice water?” the sheriff had a softer voice than folks expected for that size of amplifier. He nodded to a nearly full pitcher of clear liquid that dripped condensation on his desk. Glenn made note of the half-empty glass alongside it. If Helen's coffee cake was the office calendar, the sheriff's sobriety was the clock. Still early enough now that tomorrow the sheriff would remember their talk. Howard pulled a second glass out of a desk drawer and filled it for Glenn.

“Sheriff, you know the McCutcheon family?” Glenn sniffed at the glass. He rolled it in his hands, cold moisture against his skin. “Bill McCutcheon, works out at the lumberyard.”

“Yes, I remember Billy.” The sheriff leaned back in his chair and laced his fingers over his belly in that way that always made Glenn think of Oliver Hardy. He looked every bit of his sixty years. Up close, his eyes were often bloodshot and tiny veins curved around his pale cheeks. “He’s married to Missy, as I recall?”

Helen nodded.

“And they have a son, don’t they?”

“Henry,” Helen looked back to her notes. “Hank is what Stanley at the lumberyard called him.”

“How are the McCutcheons?” the sheriff asked.

“I was fixing to head over to their house and find out,” Glenn said. “Sounds like Bill hasn't shown up for work the last couple days. Helen called their home and didn’t get any answer.”

“That does seem odd,” the sheriff frowned. “I haven't seen Bill in a while, but he's real reliable as I recall. Have you called the school to see if their son is absent?”

“I'll do that next,” Helen said.

“I'll drop by their house,” Glenn turned to leave. “Let you know what I find.”

“Maybe they’re under the weather and forgot to call in.” The sheriff nodded with a thoughtful look. “I'm sure they'll turn up.”

The office phone rang and Helen went to her desk to answer. Glenn ducked in his office to get his hat and straighten his uniform. Waiting for Helen to finish on the phone, he took the glass filled with what Glenn guessed was gin, and dumped it into the palm tree’s terracotta flowerpot.

Helen hung up the phone. “No need to call the school. That was them, notifying us that Henry hasn't been in school the last two days. Missy, neither. They can't get any answer at home, either.”

Glenn stood quiet for a moment. He'd have gathered his thoughts if he'd known what to think.

“You want to make some calls?” he asked. “Check with the state police, some of the hospitals.”

“All right.”

Glenn put on his hat and left.

*****

THE SHERIFF’S OFFICE was on Grand Avenue, a block off Main Street. Glenn kept his cruiser, with the Sommersville Sheriff's Office logo on both sides, parked in front. The sheriff had his own squad car, but it was parked out back and most days he was unfit to drive by midday. There was never any traffic worth speaking of; even Main Street never got that busy. On a cooler day, Glenn could have comfortably walked to the McCutcheons’.

He always kept the radio turned to an AM station at low volume; he was alone often enough and the talk radio was better company than ghosts.

“A Hoosier constituent of mine recently asked, why is the Congress spending so much time on the Iran-Contra Affair when there are so many other important things to do.”

Even Glenn, no student of politics, recognized Lee Hamilton's voice, Congressman from Indiana, though he couldn't recall which district.

“...in the course of the conduct of the nation's business, something went wrong, seriously wrong. If something goes wrong in our system, we want to bring it out into the open, examine it, learn from it, and, if possible, correct it.”

He'd heard here and there in the news about soldiers and drugs and weapons all changing hands down in Central America. Arms deals in Iran and a Nicaraguan dictator. It all sounded like some kind of movie.

“This excessive secrecy led policy astray. A small number of officials made policy outside the democratic process. Secret policies, different from stated policies, cast doubt on our political process and our credibility in the eyes of Americans...”

The McCutcheon house was seven blocks down Grand on a corner lot. He parked on the street in front. It was a simple, white, wood-frame house with maroon-colored shutters attached to the windows. An L-shaped porch wrapped around the front and one side. An oak and a sycamore cast shade over the front yard and the house. A kid-sized plastic basketball hoop stood in the concrete drive. He could see a piece of the backyard surrounded by a chain-link fence. A handful of busybodies huddled on the street corner.

Glenn stepped across the lawn, still wet with dew, to the onlookers, mostly a few elderly folks. One man who looked about eighty stepped up when Glenn approached. He had little patches of white hair around his head, and his hands shook when he pointed, which seemed to be something he did quite regular.

“About time you got here,” the old man said. “I was fixin' to take my shotgun to that dog.”

“Oh, Lord.” An elderly woman behind him, next to another man Glenn took to be her husband, shook her head. “You calm down and let this man do his job.” To Glenn, she said, “We live just next door. We haven’t heard anything out of the ordinary. Except for the dog, that is.”

“Was there a break-in?” Glenn took off his hat and looked at the house. Morning sun couldn't reach it under the trees.

“Break-in?” The old man pointed to the house. “It's that damn fool dog. Been barking all night. Never done that before.”

Glenn had barely noticed the steady barking of a dog but now it was about all he could hear.

“All night,” the woman behind him said. Her husband nodded but kept quiet. Her eyes opened wide at the word “break-in.” “Did something happen to the McCutcheons?”

“Oh, I imagine they're fine.” There would be enough gossip without Glenn adding to it. “Any of you folks speak to the McCutcheons lately? You remember the last time you saw them?”

“I just saw their little boy out playing at that basketball hoop over the weekend,” the woman said. Her husband nodded some more.

“They were out in their driveway Sunday morning.” the first old man pointed. “Fixing up their boat, looked like.”

“What kind of boat is it?” Glenn asked.

“Plain old fishing boat,” the old man said. “Fifteen foot, maybe.”

Glenn scanned across the yard to the driveway. No car. No boat.

“Well, they're most likely out on a fishing trip then,” Glenn said. “I'm just checking in, making sure the house is all right.”

“You fixin' to take care of that dog?” the old man pointed again.

“I'll look into it.” Glenn avoided the wet grass; he walked back around the corner and up the driveway. From this angle the house shielded him from the barking sound and made room for other noises to crowd in: a driver revving their engine on Main Street, birds fluttering in the trees, his boots scraping on the concrete. He stepped up onto the porch and rang the doorbell; waited a few seconds and rang again; opened the screen and rapped on the door.

The door was unlocked. That wouldn't surprise anyone who knew the neighborhood. He opened the door enough to call through the opening. “Anyone home? Sheriff's office. Mr. and Mrs. McCutcheon?”

He walked inside. All the drapes were closed. A carpeted living room led to the kitchen with linoleum floor. The furniture all looked to be higher-end discount store merchandise. Framed family photos hung here and there on the walls. A maple hutch along one wall was covered with hundreds of little birds, geese or swans or some such, made of plastic and wood and metal, each one only a few inches tall. Sunlight filtered through the drapes and lit up dust specks so it looked like cobwebs growing in the room.

“Hello?” he said again, trying to keep his voice strong. “Anyone home?”

He walked through the kitchen. Other than a few dishes in the sink, it was all clean. A mix of apples and pears were stacked in a bowl on the kitchen counter. A handful of photographs lay on a two-person breakfast table against a wall. He gave a start when the refrigerator clicked on. The noise made him think to look inside. Cheese, lunch meat, orange juice, and opened jars of condiments, jelly, olives, and various other things. It all looked fresh. A half-full gallon of milk was still inside the expiration date.

A hallway off the kitchen took him to a bathroom and two bedrooms. He tapped on doors and called their names as he went. The beds were made. The house was empty.

He stood in the living room and felt the quiet expand around him. The dog outside could have been a million miles away. He’d once seen a movie on late night TV called The Incredible Shrinking Man. An astronaut got himself doused with cosmic rays and started shrinking, smaller and smaller, till he just up and disappeared. That was how Glenn felt, smaller every second while the dead silent house grew larger.

Sinking into that absence while it took over the world was the moment Glenn had a feeling no one would ever see the McCutcheon family again.

*****

HE FORCED HIMSELF out of the quiet and through a kitchen side door into the backyard. He felt near suffocating and took in deep breaths. The backyard was enclosed by the chain-link fence. A pair of plastic chairs and a charcoal grill were arranged on a concrete pad next to the house. A wood shed, painted barn red with white trim, stood in a far corner of the yard. A sycamore bigger than the one out front covered half the yard, including a six-foot tall metal jungle gym. The dog was all he could hear now. A muscular black Lab, must have been sixty or seventy pounds, pulled against a chain tied to a post at the back of the yard, a measure that seemed unnecessary with the fence. The dog barked and growled and flashed its teeth. Two wide metal bowls lay next to the post. One was empty, and the other looked to have about an inch of water left in it. The dog charged forward, hit an invisible wall at the end of the chain that jerked its body up and back, then charged again. Every time the dog raised up, Glenn thought of the way those horses towered over the little boy in his dream.

Glenn inched along the edge of the yard, out of the dog's reach. The neighbors watched from the street but the dog's jaws kept him focused. He put his hands behind him to feel his way along the fence while he kept his eyes on the dog.

Thankfully the shed was unlocked. He pounded on the door on the off chance. He grabbed the handle and pulled the door open. The smell of gasoline and stale grass spilled out. He could make out the shadow of a lawnmower. The doorway and dusty windows didn't let in enough light to see the thing he was looking for. Glenn ducked his head into the darkness. Soon as he did, he heard a crack and the dog went quiet.

He stumbled away from the shed; raised his arms in front of his body, as if that would do any good. The rest of him froze up and he squeezed his eyes shut tight. That dog shot across the yard so fast you'd have thought it was levitating. It took flight a good ten feet before it hit Glenn. The deputy let out a shout. The dog landed square on his chest and they both fell over.

Glenn was too petrified to think of reaching for his gun but the weight of the dog would have complicated that anyhow. It took a few seconds to realize the dog wasn't looking to inflict pain. It slobbered all over his face with that big Lab tongue.

“All right,” Glenn groaned. “All right.” He pushed at the dog's side and rolled sideways to get the animal off him. The dog's tail flicked back and forth; she hopped around a bit then ran in circles in the yard.

Glenn stood, dusted himself off, and leaned against the fence while he got his wits back about him. He pulled back when the dog charged at him a few times but it looked to be playing.

He looked in the shed again. This time the dog joined him and pointed him right at what he was looking for. Glenn pulled the lid off a metal bin filled with dry dog food and a plastic scoop. He scooped up a measure of food and flung the pieces in the grass. The dog's tail stayed in the air while it slid its nose around the ground and chewed up the food. Glenn filled the water bowl from a spigot on the side of the house. He went back in the house while the dog was still distracted. He debated putting the dog inside, but on second thought that would contaminate a possible crime scene, not to mention having to answer for damages if the family came back and found their furniture eat up.

Inside, the same shrinking feeling from earlier compressed him. He stirred himself enough to check the answering machine, next to the phone on the hutch with the birds. Two messages from the school, looking for Henry. Three messages from the lumberyard that worked their way from irritation to anger to honest worry. Glenn lost his gaze in the flock of tiny, artificial birds that never stopped struggling to take flight in a space too airless to offer any lift.

He tried to be optimistic and turned on the overhead light in the kitchen before he left.

Outside, the world went back to normal proportions again. The nosy neighbors still watched from the street.

“Nothing to worry about.” He waved at them. His shaky voice didn't convince himself, so it didn't seem likely the others would buy it. “Everything's fine.”

The dog came to a corner of the yard where it could see Glenn. It wagged its tail, grinned, and yapped a couple of times. Glenn tried to roust himself from that depressed feeling enough to consider the steps he needed to take.

He got in his car and hightailed it back to the station.

*****

“I DO HOPE they're all right,” the sheriff fussed in his office. He'd reached a point where he could get weepy any minute, clear-headed enough for conversation but more deliberate in choosing his words. “You'll need to check with the state police. They can put an all-points out for the vehicle. And contact hospitals, too, of course.”

“Helen's making the calls now,” Glenn said.

“If they haven't turned up seventy-two hours after the initial report, we can identify them as missing persons. Let's hope that doesn't happen, but if it does, I’m afraid you'll need to canvas the neighborhood. See if Josh can help. The overtime won't be a problem. Maybe the state can spare a few troopers to help. A search will stir people up, but if the family is really missing we can't waste time.”

Glenn could imagine the fun the state troopers would have with that, a local yokel sheriff's office losing a whole family.

The sheriff let out a gin-soaked belch Glenn could smell across the office.

“See if they have any relatives in the area. And interview employees at the lumberyard, of course.”

The sheriff filled his empty glass from the pitcher that was growing empty itself. The chair squeaked under him as he moved.

“Anything else I ought to do right now?” Glenn asked.

The sheriff lifted himself in slow motion and eased onto the sofa. He stretched his legs across the floor and lay his head back.

“No, my boy. Let's hope for the best.”

Glenn turned to leave but couldn't help asking.

“Sheriff...?”

“I know what you're thinking, Glenn.” His eyes were closed. “We don't get missing persons in Sommersville. As I said, let's hope for the best.”

Helen made calls from her desk, as she'd been doing all morning. A Bible lay on her desk next to a copy of Reader's Digest with an inside page folded over to mark her place. Glenn remembered his mom reading those when he was a kid. When he glanced through them the Drama in Real Life stories always frightened him. Folks back then got themselves into all sorts of dangerous situations without even trying. Glenn had got so he was nervous leaving the house, afraid he'd get caught in a coal mine collapse or boating disaster or some other catastrophe. Growing up in a state that suffered tornadoes on a regular basis didn't help. He never asked his folks what he could do to avoid those jams, they would have more than likely laughed at him and moved on.

“Give Josh a call,” Glenn told Helen in between phone conversations. Josh Avery was their night-shift deputy who helped out with day-shift work the rare times they needed it. “If the McCutcheons don't turn up by...I guess Friday, we'll need him to put in some overtime to help with a search. And...looks like we’re going to need those missing persons forms.”

*****

GLENN SPENT most of the afternoon up to the lumberyard, off State Road 24 a few miles outside town, interviewing everyone he could. The air all around smelled of saw dust. Trucks loaded with boards rumbled in and out across the gravel parking lot, saws screamed with blades as tall as a man, and the men (they were all men, other than the receptionist) worked harder in a few hours than Glenn did in a typical month.

“Bill's a good guy,” Stanley, the yard manager, said. A burly fellow with a buzz cut, he wore a whistle around his neck so he could get folks’ attention straight away. “Works better than some, not as good as others. He never missed like this, not without a call. He all right?”

They all asked. Is Bill all right? Is the family okay? They answered their own questions by answering Glenn's. Bill hadn't said anything about travel plans. His work history was reliable. He looked healthy the last time they saw him, just this Friday last. No one had any reason to think about drug or alcohol use, no more than a few beers now and then, at any rate. They hadn't heard talk of any family problems. Most of them never much saw family members, but a few of the families got together for pizza now and then, and Missy and little Hank behaved normal last time, even though no one was sure about the dates.

By the time Glenn wrapped it up and went back to town, they all had a sense the world didn't look all right for the McCutcheon family.

He checked in at the station and said good night to Helen. The sheriff was asleep on his sofa, where he ended up as often as not. He had a small house on Hawthorn Street, past Main from the office, and on those nights he was able to go home, he was generally late coming in the next morning.

On his way home, Glenn parked his car on Main Street and stepped into Hopewell's Groceries-Deli-Hardware. Townsfolk went to Kokomo or Logansport for more substantial grocery-buying, and made a day trip to Indianapolis for serious shopping, but Hopewell's got most residents through most days. It wasn't changed much since the days his mom dragged herself through the grocery aisles or Glenn followed the Old Man up and down the hardware aisles. Constructed like an enormous garage seated on concrete with industrial-strength fans blowing flies off the produce in summer and jackets near mandatory in the winter. The name ran across the front windows in peeling yellow paint with the profile of a Native American's head like on the old Buffalo nickels. They used to have a slogan under the name, “We're no Indian givers!” but some activists came along in the 1970s and convinced the owner to give that up. The owner, a beer-bellied man with hair the color of black shoe polish, grandson of the store's founder, mostly strolled the produce aisles boasting about the tomatoes and trying to flirt with housewives.

Glenn stood in line at the deli section near the front of the store. Most evenings he didn't have much appetite unless he picked up dinner at the deli; the smells of salads, meats, and poultry, perked up the taste buds. Two women in aprons and hairnets scooped up food into plastic containers, weighed them, wrote prices on the lids with felt markers, and rang up the sales; this was the deli's busiest time of day, about as busy as anything ever got in Sommersville. A TV screwed to the wall over the deli cash register broadcast the same Congressional hearings he'd heard over the radio earlier. A man talking, identified on the screen as a U.S. Congressman, said, “We are here about the truth; we are here about accountability; we are here in these hearings about the use of zeal and power to accomplish, as a result, a laudable purpose in the cries of some.”

“Crazy, huh?” a tall, lanky man with thin light brown hair stood next to Glenn in line. An elastic band held rimless eyeglasses tight to his head and he wore long cargo shorts and hiking boots. He jerked his head toward the TV. “Try to help out those poor folks in Central America and a bunch of politicians lose their minds over it.”

“Can't say I been following it,” Glenn shrugged. “Most of it's over my head.”

The man gave his order to one of the women behind the counter. He turned back and stuck a hand out to Glenn. “Walter Joyce. I'm a field engineer. Free agent, so I work for all kinds of companies.”

Glenn introduced himself and shook Joyce's hand. “Field engineer...like minerals, that kind of thing?”

“Among other things. I scout out areas that look promising for development. Forestry, natural gas, you name it. If I come across a place I think has potential, I report it back to the home office and they send out experts in whatever field.”

A stranger at Hopewell's was sure to be noticed. A stranger talking about forestry and mining guaranteed anyone within earshot tuned in to the conversation.

“I like to make acquaintance with local law enforcement,” Joyce said. “Folks sometimes get a lot of emotions stirred up when they hear the kind of work I do. A stranger wandering around taking notes might look suspicious. I like to know who I can turn to if things get uncomfortable.” He held up his hands, palms toward Glenn. “Not that that happens often. You just never know.”

“I'm surprised your company sends you out alone,” Glenn said. “Sounds like important work. They could give you some backup.”

“As I said, I don't work for a company,” Joyce said. “Sometimes I’m directed and others I just go where the mood strikes.”

A plump high school girl named Rhonda, behind the counter, handed Joyce a plastic bag with several foam containers of food. “Thank you, Miss,” he said. To both of them, he said, “I'm so happy when I find good local cuisine, instead of one more fast food burger joint.” Joyce angled himself to talk to Glenn again. “Almost as good as mom used to make, right?”

“Better, I hope,” Glenn frowned.

“Anyway, I'm a contractor. It's a liability thing.” He gave Glenn a collaborative elbow nudge. “Lets everyone off the hook legally. I can blame any one of a number of companies. The company can say I'm independent and they had no idea what I was up to. Ends up with everyone pointing their fingers every which way. There's not much a jury can do with that.”

Joyce stepped over to the register to pay for his food. Glenn told one of the deli workers what he wanted. No need for pleasantries; everyone at Hopewell's was a regular, except this Joyce fellow. Customers mostly ignored the televised hearings as the latest talking head shared his thoughts.

“The national preoccupation with this matter hangs like a dark cloud over our government, diluting its effectiveness in dealing with domestic problems and weakening our position in the world arena. Our responsibility now is to see that the facts are laid out clearly and completely for the American people. They are capable of arriving at their own judgments about the wisdom of the policies that spawned this tragic affair. Let the chips fall where they may...”

Glenn took his food and settled up with Susan at the register, with her gravel voice and brown hair turning gray. She took his cash and jerked her head in the direction of Joyce, who had stepped out and stood on the sidewalk in front of the store.

“Did he say natural gas companies are looking around?” she asked.

Glenn shook his head. The last thing the town needed was more speculation over thin air. “Sounds like he's just passing through.”

He carried his dinner out to the sidewalk where Walter Joyce waited. “Another benefit of me being a contractor, Deputy. If a company finds something based on one of my leads, I get a percentage. If somebody helped me out, or made my job easier,” he spread his hands wide, sharing the imaginary wealth, “I make sure everyone gets taken care of.”

He handed Glenn a business card with Walter Joyce, Field Agent and Coolidge Mining and a phone number. “Field agent, free agent, it’s all the same,” he said. “I’ve got a dozen cards, depending on who’s paying the bills this week. Phone number just goes to my pager.” He tapped the device secured to his belt. “Appreciate making contact with you, Deputy.”

Unsure what to say, Glenn settled for, “Good luck to you.”

Joyce shook Glenn's hand and climbed into his own vehicle, a black soft-top Jeep with splatters of dried mud on the sides.

Glenn had one last chore before he went home. He drove by the McCutcheon house and parked in the driveway this time. In the fading sunlight he could see a window bright with the light he had turned on earlier. Standing in the driveway, he looked around the neighborhood, all quiet except for the dog barking from the backyard. Across the street, a silhouette with tense shoulders peered through parted drapes; probably the man who had threatened shotgun action that morning.

Glenn stayed out of the house, he couldn't imagine that empty feeling amplified by pending nightfall. He paused at the gate to the backyard. The dog jumped around, barked, and wagged its tail. It's white teeth grinned through the approaching night. He saw it had dug up a bed of petunias alongside the house and that explained why it had been chained.

It was the first time Glenn had smiled all day.

He worked his way across the yard while the dog ran circles around him. “All right, now,” he said. “Settle down.” He opened the shed, took a heaping scoop of dog food out of the bin, and tossed it in the dog’s bowl this time. He stood for a moment and breathed in the night air while the dog sniffed out the bits of food. All he heard was a few crickets and a TV next to someone's open window a few houses down. Sommersville was a quiet town but there was such a thing as too much quiet. He looked at the pee-wee basketball hoop in the driveway. Recalled the family photos on the walls inside. This home was meant for the sounds of a family.

While the dog worked on the food, Glenn went to his car and drove off. He hunched over the steering wheel and watched in the rear view mirror, just to make sure no evil spirits were on his tail.

*****

GLENN POURED a glass of water from the tap and laid his dinner out on the coffee table in the living room: chicken salad sandwich, potato salad, coleslaw, macaroni and cheese. He usually waited to eat after the TV news was over; it only depressed him. Most nights the independent station out of Indianapolis kept him company with an old horror or science-fiction movie. Tonight they showed Assignment: Outer Space, about a pushy reporter sent to study up on some astronauts on a space station while they got into some fantastical situations. The cardboard sets and effects made for a universe where courage was easy to muster. Movies like this kept his mind off his own life and off the world outside of town, with its vast wonders and ancient terrors. He’d tried the conventional horror movies and found them too lifelike. No Drama in Real Life for him.

He ate from the bowl of mac and cheese and stood at the sliding door while the characters carried out their adventures. The house had no air conditioning, so the glass door and most of the windows were opened to the screens. The door led to a concrete patio and the backyard. His house on the far corner of Windsor Estates, southeast of town, could have been the edge of the world. The last streetlight stood just before his driveway, and past the backyard was pasture and farms. A chain-link fence stretched around the weedy back yard. A tired wood shed, eight foot to a side with peeling white paint, sat in a far corner of the yard.

Developers across Indiana referred to the neighborhood as Windfall Estates, built in the 1950s when Chevy stirred up talk of raising up a factory, and everyone got the idea they were finally going to hit the jackpot once the post-war boom bestowed its blessings on all the small towns. The Old Man thought he was smart, buying in for a double lot, a big production for a two-bedroom, one-bath house, a bit over a thousand square feet worth of average. The Chevy rumors dried up about the time construction was finished and the loan papers signed. The forest and farmland around them hadn't been disturbed any further; one windfall development was all anyone figured they would get out of a town the size of Sommersville.

What with his mother gone all these years and the Old Man where he was, Glenn staying in the house made sense, financially and otherwise. Neighbors were nice enough, though they would always be wary around Glenn because they hadn’t forgotten his father constantly hitting them up for odd jobs or loans, with the nerve to try and show off his intelligence all the while. Glenn hadn't changed much inside the house, including most of the furniture. Sheriff's deputies in small towns didn't get paid a lot, and whether he liked the decor or not, he doubted he had the sense to pick anything better.

He heard a dog barking somewhere in the neighborhood. He thought again of the McCutcheons. Like the sheriff said, We don't get missing persons. Small town folks don't just up and disappear. He had goose bumps thinking about the emptiness in that house sucking all the life out of the world. That brought him back to the dream about the boy and the horses. Nights like this, with crickets and frogs singing a hymn to early summer, he might as well be the last man on earth. He finished his dinner about the time the movie ended, when the reporter who was supposed to be in the way ended up saving the day.

He fell asleep on the couch, the old sofa with a busy geometric pattern in a hundred shades of black and gold that must have looked fashionable in one decade or another. The screen turned to static when the TV station stopped broadcasting, laying out shaky light across the room. That barking dog kept him tossing and turning. At some point he figured no one in Windsor Estates even owned a dog that sounded like that, and certainly wouldn't leave it out to bark all night. Glenn figured maybe it was all in his head.

2

The phone rang. Glenn stretched his body, achy from the sofa. He'd fallen asleep with a cardboard potato salad container on his chest. He dropped it on the coffee table and stumbled into the kitchen to answer the phone on the wall by the fridge.

“Glenn? Hey, it's Josh. Sorry to wake you so early, man.” Josh Avery, the night-shift deputy. Young and still filled with too much future to fret about the past. Glenn shook his head and looked around to gauge the light coming in the windows. There wasn't any. Not even sunrise yet. “I figured I'd better call somebody. And the sheriff...well...”

“Yeah, it's all right.” His own voice sounded foggy. “Something happen?”

“I got a call from a guy who lives out by the McCutcheons. I saw the file, about them missing and everything. Anyway, he's an older guy, he said he was outside cause he heard their dog barking all night and wanted to know what we were going to do about it.”

Glenn sighed. “I got a good idea who it is. Did he say anything about a shotgun?”

“Yeah... Yeah, I don't think he was serious, though.”

“He's not. I'll go check on the dog once it's daylight. Might have to turn it into the pound if they don't turn up soon.”

“The dog's not the problem. The old guy said he went out to yell at it and saw the front door was wide open. Sounds like there was a break-in.”

*****

THE SUN was nearly up by the time Glenn pulled into the McCutcheons' drive. He left his hat in the cruiser. The dog barked from behind the chain-link fence. A dozen people loitered in the street today. Against his better judgment, he went to them. One of them was a woman Glenn's age with mousy brown hair and dressed in a brown-and-white convenience store uniform. He’d forgot she lived out this way.

“Damn fool dog ain't worth spit,” the old man from the day before spoke up. “Barks all the time, how are we supposed to know the place is being robbed?”

“Do you know it was robbed?” Glenn asked. “Did you see anyone? Any suspicious activity?”

“The door's open,” the old man pointed to the house. “They ain’t home. You reckon that's suspicious?”

“Something happen to the McCutcheons?” a teenage boy with a backpack, on his way to school, asked.

“They went missing,” the older woman from yesterday said, her silent husband bobbing his head alongside her.

“We don't know that,” Glenn held up his hands. “Could be, they're just traveling and forgot to let anyone know. You know how long the door's been open, by any chance?”

“You were there yesterday,” the first old man said. His voice got whinier the longer he talked. “You didn't leave it open, did you?”

Glenn paused too long to be convincing. “No, I closed it.”

While the others whispered gossip, the angry man said, “Maybe it’s gang activity.” He didn’t look to be joking. “I’m reading things in the paper all the time about these gangs, they look to be taking over half the country. Seems it’s a matter of time before they get to us smaller towns.”

“You see any signs of gangs in town, you give the office a call right away.” Glenn wasn’t even sure what gang activity would look like and expected the old-timer didn’t, either. He turned to the blond in the retail getup. A small button pinned to her front said I can't drive fifty-five. “Hey, Angie.”

“Hey, Glenn.” She nodded toward the house, took a last drag on a cigarette and flipped it onto the asphalt. “Did something really happen to them? I saw them out walking just last week.”

“We're just trying to locate them. Being safe.”

“You didn't leave the door open, did you?” she smirked.

“No.” He tried to be angry. “How you been?”

“I'm all right. Benji's out for the summer next week, starting fourth grade in the fall. And, Randall, 'course,” she grinned. Some folks questioned if Randall really was Benji's biological father. Not to his face, of course, what with him being a state trooper who’d spent more time lifting weights than he’d ever spent in school. “He's doing real good. Everyone's saying he's going to get promoted to sergeant and take command of a district. We'll finally get out of this stupid town. How about you? You ever going to make any big plans?”

Glenn sighed and looked everywhere but in her smart aleck face.

“I don't figure to.”

“You never changed since high school,” she said. She raised a hand to fluff her hair and Glenn noticed the high school class ring she wore, a silver band with a turquoise stone. Glenn had wanted his own class ring at the time but there hadn’t been money for it. He didn’t miss it. “I still don't know what I ever saw in you.”

She'd been telling him that since they broke up all those years ago. He was pretty sure she’d said it the very day she dumped him. He said the first thing he could think of that might remind her they came from the same town. “How's things at the Junction Mart?” The gas station/convenience store out west of town on SR 24.

She shrugged and didn't take the bait. “It's a paycheck. Once Randall moves up, we'll get us a place in a real city. I'll stay home with Benji after that. Might even have another kid.” She turned her chin up, defiant at the question he hadn't even thought of. “Thirty-five's not too old. There's still time yet.”

“Well...” Glenn saw the gossip-mongers getting restless. A missing family wasn't something you could sit on too long in a small town. If they didn't turn up soon, half a dozen versions of the truth would run wild. He addressed the group. “Any of you know the dog's name?”

No one did.

He walked across the front lawn.

“You go get ‘em, Glenn,” Angie laughed. “Can't be that hard to find, a town this small.”

He rapped on the wide-open front door. “Hello? Sheriff's office. Anyone home?”

Morning light was improving and he saw bits of dried mud inside the doorway. He didn't remember it from yesterday and wondered how he'd done such a half-assed job. Should've brought the camera and then dusted for prints. Including the ones he'd already deposited. Don't rely on memory is what the sheriff had told him over and over. Easy to forget in a town with so little to remember.

He walked through every room of the house, the same emotional black hole as before. Nothing looked disturbed. Not that he'd paid enough attention the first time. He stopped in the living room and closed his eyes. He tried to hear over his beating heart, thudding as if he was in the dream and the horses' hooves were kicking him directly. He steadied himself with some deep breaths. Recalled as many details from yesterday as he could.

A comeback to Angie hit his mind too late to be useful. She'd said We'll finally get out of this stupid town when she got pregnant with Benji ten years ago, and she was still here.

Glenn opened his eyes and went to the kitchen. The bowl with pears and apples was empty. He took a white handkerchief from his pocket, carried for just this reason but used so infrequently he'd forgotten its existence, and opened the fridge. Most of the shelves were empty except for a couple of plastic containers with leftovers and the jar of olives.

“Dammit.”

Glenn knew someone who didn't eat olives.

As he moved through the house, he turned the latches on any windows that weren't already locked. He took a framed 8×10 photo of all three family members off the wall. It looked to be fairly recent, based on the kid's age. It could have been any family anywhere, mother, son, and father, smiling at the camera like they didn't have a care in the world. He couldn't recollect his parents ever taking pictures, much less one with all three of them.

He found a ceramic bowl on the hutch with coins, a few dollar bills, and three keys on a metal loop.

He tried the keys in the front door till he found the one that worked and put the keys in his pocket. He refused to acknowledge the lookie-loos and strode around the house to the backyard. The dog got excited when it saw him. He put out another bunch of food from the shed.

Glenn got in his cruiser and drove to the station. In his rear view mirror, he saw Angie laughing while she talked to the other neighbors.

*****

JOSH AVERY sat at Helen's desk when Glenn arrived. Josh was a tall, slender guy with a big mop of dark hair. Still in his mid-twenties, he worked night-shift at the sheriff's office and took criminology classes in the daytime at the community college in Kokomo. Most times, the night-shift was even easier than Glenn's job. Just answer the phones and, on weekends, follow-up a few drunk-and-disorderlies; call Glenn or the sheriff if something serious came up.

“Hey,” he nodded when Glenn walked in. The office was still dark except for the desk light. Josh had a map of town spread out in front of him. “What happened?”

Glenn tipped his head sideways, not sure how to respond. “Nothing serious. Some food missing is all I could find. Talked to the neighbors, all they got is wild guesses. Probably won't amount to anything.”

“Do you think the McCutcheons...I mean, all three of them? They couldn't have been kidnapped, right?”

“I don't know what to think.”

“Helen said we might be going door-to-door.” Josh pointed at the map. “I figured I'd get a head start, sketch out some territory, see what you think. Easy enough, if it's just the two of us.”

“Sheriff here?”

Josh nodded and jerked turned his head to the sheriff's office. “Sound asleep.”

Glenn looked into the darkness. “He might be able to help with a search. Part of the day. I'm still hoping they'll turn up. You go ahead and take off, once Helen gets here, or the sheriff comes to. You want to make a copy of this?” Glenn put the photograph of the McCutcheons on the desk. “We can show it to people. Might need to make some fliers, too. Maybe you can make some up tomorrow night. Or, tonight, I guess.”

“Sure, I'll get on it. It's been quiet otherwise.”

Glenn rummaged around in a file cabinet drawer filled with odds and ends. He fished out the station's cheap model 35mm camera and a role of film months past the expiration date that he hoped was still good. A fingerprint kit was in there with it.

He went back to Josh and looked at the map. Pointed with an index finger. “I'll take that area.”

Josh looked up at him. “You sure? I mean... I just... You know, with your dad there and all.”

Glenn sighed and walked to the door. “No reason you need to put up with him.”

*****

THE SALEM RIVER, barely wide enough in sections to qualify as a river, marked the unofficial northern boundary of town, coming in from the northeast, paralleling town on the north side of Church Street, and heading off to the west, then a few miles later it turned south and joined up with other streams until it emptied into the Wabash River. Two bridges crossed the Salem into town; one crossed SR 24 and the other was a truss bridge on Dublin Road, running north and south.

Trees and shrubs and weeds grew along the river banks most places, but here and there a sandy clearing offered access for fishermen. The river wasn't big enough to generate much noise, except after a heavy storm. Remnants of stone structures were visible on both banks next to the Dublin Road bridge. A horse ferry had operated there in the days before automobiles, part of a bigger development plan that, like all the other big plans, fizzled out when outsiders, in this case the state government, found greener pastures elsewhere. Horses would stand on the ferry on a kind of treadwheel, connected to the shaft of the paddle wheels by a set of gears and cogs; when the horses walked, the whole mechanism turned the paddle wheels and moved the ferry. They were safer than the early steam ferries, and offered more comfort to rural folk who tended toward superstition of new machines, and stayed in operation until the first car bridge was built in the early 1900s. Most of the ferry stations had crumbled away, but enough sections of wall remained on the town side of the bridge to offer shelter.

Glenn headed to the ferry station ruins after he parked his car along the river side of Church Street. The only traffic worth speaking of at this hour was the few townsfolk who worked at the auto plant in Kokomo or others going out to do farm work around the county.

He stumbled his way down the dirt and gravel embankment, past a stand of willow trees, getting dirt on his hands as he steadied himself. He got a chill following the river’s ancient descent into the earth, as if the town above could vanish while his eyes were turned.

“Dennis?” he yelled. “Hey, Dennis! You around?”

A gray plastic tarp was stretched over part of the ferry ruins to provide cover from sun and rain. A handful of plastic and foam coolers were lined up against a wall fragment. An empty pickle jar stood on one of the coolers. Glenn tried to recall what brand he had seen in the McCutcheons' refrigerator.

“Over here, partner.” Dennis sat in the open area under the bridge. The remains of a camp fire smoked on the opposite side of the bridge span. Some corroded eating utensils and a frying pan were in between the dying fire and a five-gallon plastic bucket half full of acorns. Dennis had figured out years ago how to boil the tannins out of the acorns, like the natives had, so they were safe to eat. Glenn had tried them once, and they were bitter but not half bad. A bedroll of an old sleeping bag and several blankets was stretched out alongside Dennis. His clothes were rags; torn, faded jeans, hiking boots that looked to be a size too large, a striped flannel shirt, and an old broad-brimmed straw hat. His hair and beard were long and disheveled enough that more than one townsfolk had described him as a “blond Charles Manson.”

Glenn understood the hypocrisy of appearances.

The slight incline of the bridge where the land sloped down to the river created a larger space than a person would have guessed from the street. Dennis had staked out the area years ago and would never have turned anyone away, but as the town's sole homeless resident, had never needed to. Parents, those who hadn't met him, feared him because their children idolized his freedom. Most everyone else either tolerated him or ignored him.

“Come on in,” he waved at Glenn. Dennis ate from a jar of peanut butter with a wooden spoon he likely had carved himself. “Sit a spell.”

Glenn ducked his head under the bridge despite the ample clearance. He struggled to cross his legs in order to sit on the concrete next to Dennis. Placed his hat in his lap. Birds eager to start the day, mostly sparrows and blackbirds, chirped and flitted about in the trees. Air along the river had a staleness of decomposing foliage that somehow made it more fresh. A whiff of smoke could still be detected from the fire.

“Offer you breakfast?” Dennis pointed the spoon toward the coolers. “I got a decent mix of produce for this early in the season. Crackers. Orange juice. I don't get that every day.”

They heard the clunk-clunk of a vehicle driving over the bridge. It occurred to Glenn he hadn't eaten breakfast.

“I'll take some crackers, if you can spare them.”

Dennis walked with a deliberate stride to prevent the boots slipping. He flipped open the top of a red plastic cooler. “Hey, there's cheese, too,” he said as he pulled out a box of saltine crackers. He came back with the crackers and a package of American cheese slices.

“Appreciate it.” Glen took hold of the crackers and cheese when Dennis sat down. “Hows' things going, Dennis?”

“Doing good, my friend,” Dennis grinned. “I hear the bass are biting downstream a piece, I'm going to try my luck today. Come along, if you get the time.”

Glenn peeled open one of the cheese slices, fixed it on top of a cracker, and crunched into it. “This all looks real fresh. You must have come on some cash to buy all this.”

Dennis lowered his head while he worked on a spoonful of peanut butter. “You're my friend, Glenn. You know I'm not going to lie to you.”

“You broke into that house?”

“Wasn't any breaking involved,” Dennis said. “The door was unlocked.”

Glenn cursed himself for that.

“How'd you figure it was me? I mean, that didn't take you long.”

“You left the olives. You're allergic, right?”

Dennis laughed. “Damn, you're right. Didn't even think about it. From what I heard, the family's not going to need it. Wouldn't be right for all this food to go bad.”

“What is it you heard, exactly?”

“Well, Bob Smith and Curt Hoover were out here fishing yesterday,” Dennis said. “And Bob Smith was talking to Tom Jackson. And Tom Jackson is a friend of Andy Dyer, works out at the lumberyard.”

Dennis' knowledge of the town and its residents rivaled the sheriff.

“And they were telling me about the McCutcheons being gone.” Dennis snapped his fingers. “Just up and left. Didn't tell anyone. They ain’t going to eat this food, somebody ought to.”

“God, Dennis, what are you thinking? I know you help yourself to some food now and then and nobody much cares about it. You can't go sneaking into peoples' homes. This is serious.”

Dennis screwed the lid onto the peanut butter jar. “They in some kind of trouble? I just figured they were... I don't know, guess I didn't think about it much.”

“I've got to take fingerprints in that house and now yours are the most recent prints going to show up.” Glenn left out the part about his own prints being all over the house. “That's not going to help our investigation any.”

A pair of blackbirds flapped out of the trees and landed a few feet away, looking for scraps of food, pecking their beaks at the dirt. Dennis tossed a cracker to them.

“Investigation?”

“We don't know where they are,” Glenn said. “Family of three goes missing, no sign of them, and no word from anybody. They could be...” He wasn't ready to say dead. “They might have been kidnapped or anything. And you just made yourself a suspect.”

“Whoa, Glenn!” Dennis angled around to face Glenn more direct. “I never kidnapped nobody. All’s I did was take a little food out of their kitchen. What have we known each other, twenty years or more? I'm not going to hurt anyone, you can believe that. Hell, I was only in there a few minutes. You know I'm claustrophobic.”

The blackbirds fussed over every cracker crumb and flew away.

Glenn sighed. “I know. Plenty of folks around here wouldn't mind seeing you sent up, guilty or otherwise. Don't go back, whatever you do. And keep all this to yourself. There'll be enough gossip going around without you putting yourself in it.”

“Kidnapped.” Dennis shook his head. “Never heard of that happening here.”

“I don't know that. Any luck, they're out on a hunting trip or the like and they'll show up in a day or two.” Glenn set down the remaining cheese and crackers and stood to leave. He held his hands out with the palms pointed down. “Just stay out of it.”

“Never even met them.” Dennis shook his head. “What kind of people are they?”

“McCutcheons? I didn't know them much myself. Just average, I reckon, like the rest of us.”

Dennis looked up and grinned. “Glenn, partner, you're you and I'm me. And ain't nobody in this town like us.”

Glenn nodded. Put his hat on. “You need anything? You okay with clothes and such?”

Dennis gave the matter serious thought. “I'm good, buddy. Thanks for asking.”

“You watch your back.” He leaned forward to work his way up the embankment. “Thanks for breakfast.”

*****

THE STABLEBOY had to edge up to the horses to take the reins. He was alone in the barn but the threat of a beating pushed him forward as surely as if he'd had a hand at his back. Life didn't offer him much of a choice: beat up by his old man or kicked by legs so strong that in later years steam engines would be measured in horsepower. So he stretched out his small hand, tense, like putting it into a fire. Most any direction he looked, fear was all he saw.

*****

ONE SKINNY SLICE of coffee cake remained the morning Josh stayed after his shift to help with the search. The sheriff was still asleep in his office, never having gone home the night before.

Sitting at her desk, Helen said, “I'll call you on the radio once he wakes up.”

Glenn and Josh stepped out to the sidewalk, hands full of fliers and photographs and notepads. The few people they saw about, on foot or in cars, stared at them. Word had got around quick that the McCutcheons had disappeared. No one had spoke directly to anyone in the office about it, not yet, but the sheriff said he imagined outlandish theories were already bubbling up.

Glenn squinted into the morning sun and said, “When you talk to folks, don't let anyone off just saying no. They might have seen something and don't remember.”

“We’re not looking in houses now?” Josh asked and Glenn confirmed. “Maybe we should look in yards, keep notes about who has sheds and garages and whatnot.”

“Good idea,” Glenn said. “I got to run by the McCutcheon house first. I'll get to my area right after.”

“You still feeding that dog of theirs?” Josh grinned. “Might as well bring it home and save time.”

Glenn nodded. “They're missing persons now. Might be time for it to go to the pound. Hate to do it, but...”

They drove their separate directions and Glenn parked in the driveway at the McCutcheons' house. Most of the neighbors had got bored with standing around looking at the house and moved on to making up rumors among themselves. Only the cranky old man from the first day never seemed to get tired. Glenn had come by twice a day to feed the dog and the man was always either at the curb cursing out the dog or watching from his window. This morning Glenn saw the old guy peering out from behind his curtains. Glenn stood at the chain-link fence while the dog wagged its tail, stretched out its front legs, and bowed its head up and down. By now it recognized him and stopped barking when Glenn arrived. He took a scoop of dog food out of the shed and threw it in the lawn, listened to the dog chomping on its breakfast. He filled the water bowl from the outdoor spigot.

He squeezed his eyes shut, a habit he'd picked up in childhood, a way of shutting out the world and all its unanswered prayers. It never completely worked.

The dog had finished and sat at Glenn's feet, looking up at him, the whites of its eyes wide in question.

“All right.” Glenn pushed open the gate. “Let's go before I change my mind.” The dog stood in confusion a moment and processed the situation. When it saw it was free to follow Glenn to his car, it charged into the main yard and ran fast as it could in wide circles.

“Careful now.” Glenn opened the back door to the cruiser and waved his arm. “Let's see how you handle cars.” The dog jumped into the back seat. Glenn closed the door and climbed into the driver's seat.

He looked at the dog's panting face in the rearview mirror. “No promises now. We'll see how it goes.” He gave a deep sigh and drove to begin his area of the door-to-door search.

*****

THE DAY DRAGGED BY with no progress. Josh and Glenn kept in touch on their car radios. Helen chimed in a few times to tell them the sheriff was canvassing a few blocks. That lasted through the morning; by midday, he recalled he had important paperwork to tend to in the office.

Glenn stopped in at Hopewell's first thing to get a leash. The dog acted friendly enough but with no information on vaccines, it wouldn't do for a deputy to turn a rabid dog loose on someone. The idea that anyone in town might have kidnapped a family was too preposterous to take seriously, but when Glenn explained the dog was there to sniff out the scent if any of the missing persons were nearby, it added respectability to their search.

A pattern formed early on. Glenn knocked on a door. Sometimes no one answered; everyone was at work or shopping. Those that did answer already knew the McCutcheons were missing and wanted to ask questions about their own theories, theories that ranged from the family fleeing town to avoid trouble (“You check to see if their house payments are up to date?”) to divine intervention (“This is how it starts. We all better get our house in order.”) to criminal conspiracies (“These drug cartels take Americans for ransom. I saw it on 20/20.”).

Glenn's area took him to the Sommersville Christian Church on Church Street, paralleling the river. The street used to be Roosevelt Road, but fifteen years ago Pastor John Putnam, when he was the assistant pastor, led a movement to have the street renamed. He wanted to call it John the Baptist Avenue, but residents thought that might be reaching a bit too far, what with the pastor himself being named John. Pastor John also led the opponents to renaming another street after Dr. King in the 1970s.

The white, wood-frame church stood tall with a gabled roof and steeple. Glenn had been in the church many times, not voluntarily; every fall, Helen invited the sheriff to give a talk to Sunday School kids about law enforcement and he always asked Glenn to help out.

Not sure how God looked on canines, Glenn left the dog in the car with the windows cracked. Inside, carpeting around the wood pews was replaced regularly but was quickly worn ragged by the foot traffic of the penitent. He stepped softly to the middle of the chapel. Stained glass windows along both sides of the room, depicting the stations of the cross, filtered out most of the sun's holy light. Glenn tried not to be disrespectful of the church, but every time he came here he waited for the Holy Spirit to possess him like it had so many others. Awkward was all he ever felt.

He wondered how many kicks that kid in the dream took before he stopped feeling pain.

“Glenn Haskell.”

Glenn opened his eyes, with no recollection of having closed them.

The pastor stood by the altar. He was built sturdy, fifties, balding with a goatee, and wore canvas pants, an Oxford shirt, and athletic shoes. Glenn was more distracted by the baseball bat he held in his left hand.

“Sorry, Pastor.”

“Never apologize for coming to God's house.” Putnam approached Glenn and shook his hand. “I expected you'd pay us a visit. You know, the McCutcheons have been members here a long time. You got any leads yet on their whereabouts?”

“I wish we did.” Glenn fidgeted. “We're hoping it's just a misunderstanding.”

“Come on in my office.” Putnam gestured with the bat toward a door at the side of the altar. He waved the bat again as Glenn followed him. “Kids are just getting out of school for the summer. We're starting up the summer baseball league in a couple weeks, I'm sorting through our equipment.” He looked over his shoulder as he led Glenn into his office. A folding table just outside the door had several nearly-empty cake and pie tins with the unmistakable look of Helen's work. The office was a ten-by-ten space with a bookshelf, filled more with plaques and trophies than books, stacks of papers on the desk, and a mess of baseballs, bats, and gloves on the floor. “We can always use adult coaches and umpires. Nothing would make me happier than you coming on board.”

Putnam sat behind his desk, stretching his arms with the bat, and Glenn sat opposite.

“I'll give it some thought,” Glenn said. Putnam, direct or through Helen, had made the same invitation to Glenn many times. “You know I'm no big shakes when it comes to sports.”

“We're always here,” the pastor said. “Our kids need strong male role models. You being in law enforcement, they'd be tickled pink to work with you.” He laughed and balanced the bat upright on the palm of his hand. “Don't think I mean anything funny by tickled pink. We're strictly baseball. Us coaches go out for a beer sometimes after a game, but we all go home to our wives after.”

Glenn had heard the remarks before.

“We are all looking forward to you taking a wife of your own, Glenn,” the pastor said. “You're an important person in town, that will be a blessed day for us all. You're, what, thirty-six, thirty-seven, now?”

“Thirty-five.”

Putnam aimed the bat at Glenn. “Don't be waiting too long. God's patience is infinite but he's eager for us all to carry out his plans.” He lay the bat on the floor and rolled it toward the other equipment.

“Pastor, I just want to ask about the last time you saw the McCutcheons. Maybe they said something? Gave you some idea if they were planning a trip, that kind of thing?”

“I saw the whole family at service two Sundays ago. They were their usual chipper selves. I have been going over this in my mind and for the life of me I can’t recall one thing out of the ordinary. I tell you, Glenn, the church is all broke up about this. I baptized little Hank myself, you know that? We're planning a prayer service for them Sunday, after the usual worship service. God willing, they turn up before that.”

“Did you have any conversation with them that day?”

Putnam shook his head. “Just a 'How are you?' after the service. They looked to be in good spirits, all three of them. I'll ask around, maybe they said something to someone else. I'm sure you're doing your best, but some folks find it's easier to confide in a man of the cloth. Nothing personal.”

“We just want to find them. Make sure they're all right. Do you know anyone in the congregation they might be especially close to? Anyone they socialized with?”

Putnam shrugged. “We're all family here. We're all looking out for one another. You ask me,” Putnam leaned forward and set his forearms on his desk, “every town has its undesirable elements. Might be a good place to start. I'm not saying I've heard anything in particular, but I think you can do the math.”

Glenn never knew the formulas to Putnam’s math and wasn’t certain which undesirables he was adding up on any particular day.

“The McCutcheons have any family nearby that you know of? We're having a hard time tracking down their relations.”

Putnam leaned back, suspicious of a perpetual non-conspirator, perhaps even considering that the mark of an undesirable. “Parents are all deceased. Seems like Missy had a relative in the area. I don't think they were close. I'll ask my assistant to look through our records.” The pastor looked at him with the sharp eyes of a prosecutor. “You’ve seen their will, I assume?”

Of course he hadn’t seen their will; he hadn’t considered they might have a will.

“In the unlikely event all three of them perished,” Putnam ignored Glenn’s blank gaze, “the church would be the sole benefactor.” He lifted his hands in a gesture of matters beyond his control. “We never in our wildest dreams thought that would come to pass. But they were insistent that God’s house carry on their faith.”

Glenn wondered how many similar wills Putnam had overseen in Sommersville.

The pastor shook his head. “I'll be praying for them, Glenn, every minute. I know you will, too.”

*****

DRIVING to his next stop, he turned on the car radio to get Putnam’s voice out of his head. Even the hearings from Washington sounded better.

Mr. Liman: Did you carry over a Bible to the Iranians inscribed by the President of the United States?

Mr. Secord: They did, yes.

Mr. Liman: And the President of the United States didn't disguise who he was, did he?

Mr. Secord: No.

Mr. Liman: So it is still your testimony that the purpose of putting you in as an intermediary was to conceal the fact that the United States was dealing with Iran from the Iranians?

Mr. Secord: Sure. And it makes sense. The Iranians had to be able to say they were not dealing with the Great Satan directly, they were dealing with a company, they were dealing through Europe.

*****

GLENN’S SEARCH AREA took him to Sunrise Manor, south of Main on the west side of town. “We almost called it Sunset Manor,” the director had told Glenn the first time he went there. “But we want residents to feel like living here is the start of a new day.” It was a shabby looking beige building with a few mobile homes used as outbuildings for different resident groups to meet. The original plan included a swimming pool, but the budget always fell short and pools in Indiana either had to be indoors or covered up half the year. Nobody who ever lived at Sunrise Manor cared enough about swimming to miss it much. Glenn would have been content never to visit, but his guilt got the best of him if he didn’t show his face at least once a month.

Glenn parked near the front entrance. He barely managed to hold tight to the leash when the dog leaped from the car. He walked the dog around the grass in front of the building till she relieved herself, then allowed her to lead him to the front door. The lobby had a flimsy chandelier that looked to have come from a thrift store and a message board that could be customized with plastic letters to wish a resident happy birthday or to welcome the newest person who found out the hard way the golden years are sometimes paved with fool’s gold. They’d experimented with “In memory of” messages when someone passed away but found it just made the surviving residents cranky.

The young receptionist at the front desk, who most times barely looked up from her magazine when Glenn arrived, said, “Oh my goodness! Who is this?” and stepped from behind her desk. The dog hesitated but didn't last long against an assault of “Who's a good girl?” and ear-scratching. “Did you get yourselves a police dog?”

“Something like that. You mind if I leave it here a few minutes? It's been real calm so far.”

“Of course!” The young woman leaned over the dog and scrunched its face in her hands. It thumped its tail against the desk. “What's her name?”

Glenn frowned. “Not sure yet. I'm just taking care of it for someone.”

“We'll keep each other entertained. He's in the game room, you can go on down.”

Glenn took the stairs down to the basement “game room,”a broad room lighted by rows of long, skinny fluorescent bulbs in a low ceiling, arranged with folding tables and chairs, shelves of old paperbacks and board games, and a pool table. One wall had a kitchen setup with sink, microwave, refrigerator, and cabinets. Four people, aged in years and body and spirit, played cards at one of the tables. Two elderly women played cards at another table. A heavyset man in a wheelchair had fallen asleep in front of one of the bookshelves, a yellowed paperback open on his lap.

One of the foursome, a woman with a burst of gray hair and Coke-bottle glasses, raised her head. “Look who's here!” Her husband, seated across from her, with a round face, thinning hair and what looked to be the exact same pair of glasses, reached for a folding chair from the adjoining table. “Howdy, Glenn,” his voice was raspy and plastic tubes from a portable oxygen tank snaked around his face. “Have a seat.”

A hunched over man with squinty eyes and a weasel face – if asked under duress, Glenn would have confessed he was biased and would always see the face of a weasel – barely glanced up from his cards. “Looky there, Barney Fife's here. Shoot yourself in the foot lately, Deputy?”

Glenn frowned. “Hey, Dad.”

*****

FRIEDA AND WALT, the couple with the eyeglasses, and the fourth member, Mitchell, scootched their chairs over so Glenn could sit down. Mitchell was soft-spoken, slight and balding with eyes that always seemed inquisitive. The card game continued in stop-and-start fashion, with Samuel, Glenn's father, being the one most eager to keep playing. Samuel had entered Sunrise Manor a good fifteen years ago, after Glenn's mother passed away. At sixty, he was still the youngest full-time resident of Sunrise Manor, ten or twenty years younger than most, but he looked every bit as old as them. He could never have afforded the place on his own, but physical disability caused by a lower back injury earned him government benefits.

“You're out looking for that family that went missing?” Mitchell asked.

“Yeah. We're knocking on every door. Had to come by here anyway, so I thought I'd stop in and say hi.” Glenn watched his father, who seemed to have not heard the remark, draw a card from the deck in the middle of the table.

“I just can't believe that happened here.” Frieda's thick glasses and wild hair gave her a look of permanent surprise. “Do you think there's any chance they're still alive?”

“We don't even know if they're in danger, Frieda,” Glenn said. “We're just looking to make contact, talking to everyone in town to see if anyone might have heard from them.”

“A drunk sheriff and an amateur deputy,” Samuel said. His voice was a screechy drawl that made him sound more southern than he was. He nudged Walt, “Come on, old timer, it's your turn.” To the group, he said, “I ever turn up missing, do me a favor and call in the state police.” He put the emphasis on the first syllable so it sounded like PO-lice.

“Samuel,” Frieda hissed. “The sheriff's a good man.”

Samuel snickered, the only one besides Glenn who noticed Frieda's accidentally omitting Glenn from the compliment.

“I'm trusting none of you knew the McCutcheons personally?” Glenn asked. “You haven't seen them recently?”

They all shook their heads, Samuel with a smirk, the others in earnest.

“Any of you know anything about the family? Maybe they've got a relative living here?”

“I heard his parents were dead,” Frieda said. “I don't know about her.”

“I'll let you get back to your game,” Glenn stood. “This is serious business. We've got a family missing. I know gossip gets around here. If you hear anything, you need to get in touch with the sheriff's office.”

“You want some company?” Mitchell put his cards face down on the table. “They'll be serving lunch soon, anyhow.”

“Samuel,” Frieda stared at the Old Man, “you should spend some time with your son.”

“Frieda,” Samuel reached across the table and patted her hand, “when it comes to wisdom and beauty, you got me beat. See you all at lunch.”

Glenn completed the circuit through Sunrise Manor. The main hallway that connected the lobby, cafeteria, resident rooms, and nursing section somehow seemed longer than the outside building. No windows and minimal fluorescent lights created the feel of a cave. Glow-in-the-dark strips along the floor gave directions to anyone looking down, which was the majority, what with all the canes and walkers in use.

Being shadowed by two residents comforted the others when Glenn questioned them. His bad back most often forced Samuel to lean against something or walk in such a hunched over, lopsided fashion that he stumbled and fell on a regular basis. He refused to use a cane or walker, though multiple doctors had assured him insurance would cover the cost. Mitchell and Samuel started out on either side of Glenn, but when the Old Man let himself fall rather than lean against Glenn, Mitchell took up position between them.

“You know you can’t even use a cane in this place without a prescription from a doctor?” Samuel had complained the one time Glenn had tried to discuss the matter, ignoring the fact that any number of doctors had given him a prescription. “You believe that?”

“Can't they force him to use a walker?” Glenn had asked an aide once. “Something?”

“We did force him to,” she'd said. “Paperwork's on file. Good luck enforcing it. We don't have enough staff here on the best days.”

Bookish Mitchell did most of the talking. There were only so many times Glenn could ask Samuel how the food was, or so many times Samuel could remind Glenn who'd bought that house he was living in. (Though why a person would expect praise for that particular failed investment, Glenn never understood.) Mitchell asked about the McCutcheons, the same questions and speculation Glenn had listened to all day. Glenn stuck to the official line, the search was a precaution, and they fully expected the family to turn up safe. It didn't take much to be something in a town where nothing happened.

“You're a smart man, Mitchell,” Samuel said as they limped and stumbled through the halls of Sunrise Manor. He coughed and snorted at times and blamed it on allergies. The smell of cigarette smoke said otherwise. Tobacco use was forbidden indoors but permitted outside; Samuel generally couldn’t afford cigarettes but managed to bum a few off the staff or his fellow inmates. “You reckon a family up and goes off on vacation or what-not and forgets to tell anyone? In this town? Anyone in these parts can afford to travel most likely wouldn’t shut up about it.”

Mitchell pursed his lips. He looked at the floor as they walked.

“Didn't you use to know Missy's dad? Or her grandpa or somebody?” Glenn asked his father. Mitchell looked frightened; it was the best word Glenn had to describe his reaction.

The Old Man bobbled his head. “Everybody knows near everybody else round here. Not like we was close friends or nothing.”

They stopped at the cafeteria entrance. “Salisbury steak today,” Mitchell said. He left them at the door and stood in line with the other residents.

“You all satisfied they ain't here?” Samuel sniffed.

“No one's hurting you any,” Glenn said. “You never know who might know what.”

“Damn sure nobody in this dump knows anything.” Samuel waved a hand in disgust and turned to join his friends in line. “Nothing happening here but old people waiting to die.”

Glenn watched his father limp away. For every time the Old Man had raised a hand to him, he didn't care much about his father's injury. What he'd never gotten over was the guilt at being the one who caused it.

3

Josh reported he'd had no more luck than Glenn canvasing the town. At the end of the day, the sheriff having made it home for a change, Glenn stopped at Hopewell's and left the dog in the car with the windows cracked again. He picked up some dog supplies – dry food, stainless steel bowls, and a bag of rawhide chews. When the clerk saw him buying a leash, she advised him to pick up a couple of heavy blankets that were on discount. “You could buy an expensive dog bed,” the clerk said, “but this is just as good and a lot cheaper.” Picking up his own dinner at the deli, Susan at the register asked about the dog supplies. “You wait here a second,” she said and ran back to the meat section. She came back with a bundle in brown paper stained with grease. “There's some cow bones. I take them home for my own dog, they just get thrown out otherwise. Dogs love those to death, you'll see.”

At home, Glenn turned the dog loose in the backyard. It ran around, relieved itself, sniffed at the trees and what looked to be every blade of grass. He gave it one of the bones from Hopewell's – still dripping with gristle – and the dog lay on the puke-brown shag carpet and, after a moment of furious attack, devoured it at a leisurely pace. The animal stopped periodically to stare at Glenn, eating a sandwich and various container salads on the sofa. It circled the room a few times, studying its new world, then returned to crunching on its treasure. Glenn had never owned a dog but had seen enough of them to know, they generally bonded with their owners. If this dog accepted a new home this eagerly, how neglected had it been before? Hank McCutcheon must have had a short attention span for a dog to find Glenn more entertaining.

Glenn could count on one hand the number of times someone else had been in the house in recent years. It unsettled him, having a living creature in the room, one that looked at him with expectations Glenn couldn't have fathomed in a million years and eyes so happy you'd have thought it won the jackpot. He got distracted watching how the dog’s ears moved, from upright to flat against its head, depending on what was going on.

The independent TV station showed The Invisible Man for its late night movie. The introduction said it came out in 1933. The Old Man had done most of his growing up in the thirties, a time so different than the world Glenn had been born into, he couldn't even imagine it. Samuel had never talked about his childhood, and by the time Glenn was old enough to be curious, home was too much of a circus act for him to care.

He flinched. Remembering the dream, that little boy with the horses, reminded him of getting hit upside the head. Plenty of kids in the world got beat up a lot more than Glenn had; didn’t make it easier when it happened to him.

He felt invisible most days, had felt it most of his life. Now, when a little invisibility would have suited him fine, he was stuck out there like a pothole in a brand new road. Didn't matter what had happened to that family. If they didn't come back alive, the town would blame the sheriff's office. The sheriff would get a different kind of blame because of his condition. Glenn would get the worst of it. He saw it in their faces, going door to door, asking weak questions about who knew the McCutcheons, who saw them and when, and knowing it would all amount to squat.

The Invisible Man giggled and ran around tormenting the townsfolk. Parts of it seemed meant to be funny. Glenn didn't get the joke.

He fell asleep on the couch and woke up in the dead of night. The TV screen had turned to snow. The dog lay on its side on Glenn's feet, snoozing away. The dog looked more at home than Glenn had ever felt in this house.

*****

WHAT WITH THE deputy's job being a leisurely one most times, Glenn considered reporting in seven days a week a fair trade-off. On typical weekends, he only worked half-shifts and Josh covered the rest. He sat at Helen's desk, answered a handful of phone calls, mostly wrong numbers or people calling with traffic complaints that he forwarded to the state troopers. The most frequent calls on any given day were about kids shooting pellet guns at road signs. Fistfights broke out here and there during college basketball season and those were easy enough to get calmed down. He watched out the windows at people driving to church in the morning and driving home, or to SR 24 toward an out-of-town lunch, in the afternoon.

On this Sunday he wondered where the McCutcheons were and who else might know about it. He imagined the black Lab, left outside in the fenced-in yard, where he wondered if she would dig a hole and escape to someplace more interesting. He speculated where his mind came up with the dream about the tragic stableboy and if it meant anything. He tried to chase the sound of Angie laughing at him out of his mind, but that hadn't worked from the first time she laughed at him more than fifteen years ago. His eyes drifted outside to early summer sun interrupted by leaves from elm trees along Grand Avenue.

The sheriff, Helen, and Pastor Putnam came in. The sheriff limped, leaning on the pastor, while Helen held the door. The pastor wore his official Sunday garb, a tailored suit from a store in Chicago, but the sheriff wore what must have been a triple-large pastel-plaid shirt and khaki pants. Helen's damp eyes expressed her worry. What made it especially troubling, Sunday was the sheriff's day of rest, the one day a week he abstained.

“Can you go and fetch some water, Glenn?” the pastor asked.

On closer inspection, the sheriff wasn't intoxicated, he was breathless and sweating. Glenn brought a paper cup of water from the cooler.

“Glenn, my boy,” the sheriff mustered a weak smile. “It appears I overdid it.”

They helped him into his office and onto the sofa. He sipped at the water.

“I'm going to head back, sheriff,” Putnam said. “You're in good hands now.”

“Thank you, Pastor,” the red-faced sheriff whispered.

“There's a man never stops looking for ways to help others.” Putnam put a hand on Glenn's shoulder as he departed. “Fine role model for us all.”

“We needed help moving some folding tables,” Helen explained to Glenn. “Here he was,” she pointed at Howard, “never feeling like he’s done enough. He went and pushed himself too far.” She sighed and shook her head. To the sheriff, she said, “You scared me half to death, you know that?”

“I'm very sorry, Helen,” the sheriff said. His normal coloring, not healthy-looking to begin with, slowly returned.

Helen turned. “I got coffee cake in the car, I better bring it in before I forget.”

The sheriff motioned for Glenn to stand closer. “I would never tell Helen this, but I went there to plea with the congregation again to be patient. Pastor Putnam is a man of the cloth, but he’s more aggressive in earthly pursuits than I’m comfortable with. In one breath, he suggests armed search parties of civilians. In the next, he makes plans for the property coming to them through the mysterious grace of God.” He waved a hand and made a sour face. “I don’t know how much you follow the news.” The sheriff was being polite, he knew Glenn barely kept up with such things. “I’m sure you’re aware of manufacturing jobs declining. Well, land is another way the common man is being...diminished. Between foreign investors and over-extension of credit, small farmers are being put out of business by corporate agriculture. I’m sure the pastor has such designs; smaller scale, but the damage is done, either way. Losing family farms, in this area, why, we’re losing our identity. The McCutcheons might not a farm, but some with similar wills do. Between that and factories closing...the Midwest won’t be the same, and I imagine the rest of the country will follow.” He looked up at Glenn. “I don’t envy you, my boy. I fear you’ll live through the worst of it. I’m thankful I won’t.”

Then he gestured to Glenn. “We talked about relatives of the McCutcheon family. A member of the church reminded me this morning. Missy has a relative living outside of town, off the old turnpike. Maybe a cousin or an uncle. Crandall is his name, I'm sure of it. Check with the post office. I'm not sure why it took me so long to recall that. I suppose I was...indisposed. You understand.”

“Course, sheriff. I'll look into it.”

“Now, I'll just relax here a few minutes, and be moving along. Everything else is all right? No other emergencies, I hope?”

“Nope. Been real quiet today.”

Glenn returned to the lobby and Helen brought in not one, but two, coffee cakes. “I baked extra, what with the special prayer service and all. It was real lovely. There's a powerful lot of prayers going out for that poor family.”

After she placed the coffee cakes in the usual spot and checked on Howard again, she returned to whisper her torment to Glenn.

“He's going downhill,” she said. “Lord only knows if his heart or liver is in worse shape. I keep telling him to see a doctor, but you know how stubborn he is. A man can only go on so long...” she fluttered her hands, “living the way he does.”

“You go on home,” Glenn said. “I'll keep an eye on him.”

He cut himself a piece of coffee cake and took one in for the sheriff. They passed the time with idle chit-chat and Glenn pondered how a man with Marvin Howard's noble heart ended up wasting away in small town hell.

*****

SOON THE MCCUTCHEONS had been missing over a week with not a single lead. Talk around town started getting itself organized and a few locals formed small groups to search the surrounding countryside. The sheriff tried to be diplomatic but worried someone would get hurt. Howard's condition, the thing everyone knew but no one talked about, had people looking at Glenn to come up with answers.

He walked to Hopewell's to pick up an early lunch for Helen and himself. The sheriff was having an off day, already in no shape to eat, or converse, for that matter.

The TV in Hopewell's was tuned to the hearings in Washington. Local interest seemed to increase as the proceedings went on. That and the food were the only things distracting customers from questioning Glenn. They bought their supplies and ate their lunches and stared at the screen at these honorable men and their honorable schemes. The real world's problems were so abstract it felt like some of the science-fiction movies Glenn watched. Transmissions from some alien society. The world of presidents and arms deals and armies was light years removed from Sommersville and its puny lost family. How could a family disappear from a town that didn't even register on most peoples’ radar? Where could they go when they started from nowhere?

Mr. Liman: Were you asked to play God and choose one hostage?

Mr. McFarlane: Yes. And I asked for Mr. Buckley.

Mr. Liman: And that was the subject of some anguish to be put in the position of having to choose?

Mr. McFarlane: Yes.

Mr. Liman: And it brought home to you, I take it, what it really meant to be negotiating for hostages?

Mr. McFarlane: Well, it was very clear that this was not a- the kind of exchange that was proper.

Glenn returned to the office and found Helen in a state. A woman with short, tightly-curled hair, wearing a navy blue business suit, and holding a leather briefcase, stood near the filing cabinets. She rose above Helen's anxiety with serene eyes.

“Oh, Glenn, thank heavens you're back,” Helen said. “I was just explaining to...uh...to...”

“Special Agent Maci Fontaines.” The woman held up her ID. She pronounced it “fonten” despite the spelling on her badge. She wore a necklace of small cowrie shells. “I'm here from the FBI field office in Chicago.”

Glenn set the bags of food on Helen's desk and shook the agent's hand.

“She asked for the sheriff,” Helen fluttered, “but he's...oh...” They looked toward Howard's office and from that angle his feet were visible, stretched out on the office sofa.

“Sheriff's not feeling well,” Glenn said. “I'm the deputy. Is there something I can help you with?”

“Glenn Haskell, yes?” she smiled and held out her arms in a surprise gesture. “I'm here to help you. With your missing persons case? The Bureau investigates possible kidnappings, so, here I am.”

Glenn had never met an FBI agent. “I guess we should talk in my office?”

“I'll bring you some coffee,” Helen said. “Do you like coffee cake?”

Agent Fontaines sat across from Glenn while he fidgeted with a handful of pens and pencils and tried to figure out what to do. Her skin was the color of a penny; not the shiny new pennies, but the wheat pennies that he still came across from time to time, dark with the character of time.

“I want to be clear,” she said. “I'm not here to step on anyone's toes. My role is to offer support and any Bureau resources you might need.”

“Resources?” Glenn pondered that while Helen whirled through with two mugs of coffee and two slices of coffee cake on paper plates.

Glenn contemplated the cake and fidgeted with a plastic fork to keep his hands from shaking. He sighed and decided the FBI was too much for any bluster he might come up with. “To be honest... We don't really have any leads. They could have driven off some country road for all we know. We appreciate the offer, but I don't think there's much for the FBI to do here.”

She drew a manila file from her briefcase. “One of the subjects is a minor? Henry McCutcheon, age eight? It's routine for the Bureau to investigate abductions of minors. I understand, you haven't determined this to be an abduction, but... Sometimes in domestic abuse cases, one parent will abduct the child and the other parent pursues them.” She shrugged. “I'm definitely assigned to assist you, so... Maybe we could review the case file? Having a second pair of eyes never hurts.”

Glenn, of all people, hadn't even considered an abuse angle. No one at the lumberyard had dropped any hints in that direction. He wondered what else he forgot to consider.

“I reckon we should,” he said. “Agent...sorry, can you pronounce your name again?”

She repeated it. “It's the French word for fountains. There's no special significance to it. My ancestors were slaves who escaped on the Underground Railroad. They were so scared they didn't stop until they got to French Canada. They didn't have a family name and wanted something French in honor of their new home. I guess they didn't have a wide French vocabulary.”

Glenn already had a hard time looking her in the eyes, that didn't help any. Going to school with a ferocious cold as a young kid, the school nurse had offered him hot tea with honey, ‘cause his parents damn sure didn’t care about him coughing his lungs out. He’d never heard the word soothing till that day when he understood it perfect. Maci’s voice reminded him of that. He fumbled on his desk for the McCutcheon file; a task that should have been easy enough considering it was the only open case they had.

“Are you sure,” she asked, “I shouldn't report in to the sheriff?”

“Maybe you could do that in the morning? The earlier the better. You expecting to be here long?”

“As long as it takes us to make some progress. I didn't see a hotel when I drove in. I'd like to avoid wasting a lot of time commuting. Is there someplace in town I can stay?”

*****

“MIZ OBERLIN’S boarding house is the closest thing to a hotel in town.” Glenn lifted Maci's heavy canvas travel bag from the trunk of her rental car. By the time he closed the trunk she had lifted the luggage like it was nothing and strode over to his squad car. “She calls it a bed and breakfast.”

They climbed in and Glenn started the engine. “It might not be what you're used to in Chicago. The breakfasts are good, though.”

“That suits me fine,” Maci said. “Glenn...may I call you Glenn?...I want to make sure we get off on the right foot. I can’t over-emphasize this, I'm really not here to take over your investigation.” She watched the town pass by as they drove toward the west end of Main Street. “I'll ask questions and make suggestions, but it's your show.”

“Like I said, we don't have much in the way of leads. An FBI agent...we're a small town...this could get awful dull.”

“Dull is about the speed I'm looking for right now,” she said.

He looked toward her with a curious frown.

“So,” she focused herself back in the car, “I'll get settled in and we can look at the case. Are you sure – Miss Oberlin is it? – are you sure she'll have a room?”

Glenn gave one short laugh. “Pretty sure.”

He parked on Main Street in front of a two story brick building with doors and window trim painted the color of yellow roses. A metal sign hung from the second floor perpendicular to the building identified it as “The Empire State Bed and Breakfast.”

“Empire State?” Maci asked. They stepped out and went to the trunk.

“Family came out from New York back in the old days. Her grandpa started the bank and then her family opened up the boarding house. I guess they used to get a fair amount of traffic, but it's been slow long as I can remember.”

The lobby was fixed up like a Victorian living room that hadn't been dusted in quite a spell. Glenn tapped a bell on the registration counter. Maci and Glenn stood in awkward silence during the good five minutes it took for a slender, elderly woman with a tall arrangement of gray hair and a cane in her left hand, to edge down the stairs. She peered at them over the tops of a pair of silver-framed spectacles that looked as old as her.

“Glenn Haskell,” she said. Her voice still had a touch of eastern education and was surprisingly chipper considering her frail nature. She took his hands. “What a lovely surprise.”

“Good to see you, Miz Oberlin.” Glenn made a point of speaking loud and clear. “I brought a guest for you, I hope that's all right.”

Maci introduced herself, following Glenn's lead on volume. “Welcome, my dear,” Miss Oberlin said. “Glenn's grandfather was an associate of my father's. And his father...he's so good with mechanical things. Several times over the years he helped me with one repair or another, and for a fair price, too.”

Miss Oberlin hung the cane on a chair back and put her hands on Maci's arms, squinted over the tops of her glasses, and looked the agent up and down. “You will get some looks in this town, won't you, dear? Never mind that. This feeble leg of mine drew some ugly looks in my younger days, but I survived. It gets lonesome here and I'm glad for the company. Come on along, let me show you the rooms.” She retrieved her cane and began the laborious process of climbing the stairs. Over her shoulder, she said, “Please call me Lillie. I like to serve breakfast promptly at eight every morning...”

Maci gave Glenn an apologetic smile and followed Miss Oberlin. While Maci got settled, Glenn went out to his cruiser and called Helen on the radio. For the sake of thoroughness, he asked her to contact the FBI’s Chicago office to confirm Maci Fontaines’ identity.

*****

HELEN WAVERED between wanting to set an example for the FBI by being a good hostess and a desire to protect Marvin Howard. While Glenn took Maci to Lillie Oberlin's boarding house, Helen called members of her congregation until she found two men to take the sheriff home. Once Glenn and Maci returned to review the case file, she flew in and out of Glenn's office like a hummingbird, delivering cake, coffee, water, and paperwork.

Glenn contacted the local postmaster for the name Crandall, as the sheriff had suggested. They came up with Emmett Crandall and made a plan to interview him the following day. Having never interacted with an FBI agent, Glenn only knew the stereotype of the bossy Fed who condescended to locals, and this worried him that Maci might expect more than she let on. She came across thoughtful and methodical, listening more than he’d have bargained for from the FBI. Considering he couldn't remember the last time he'd spent more than half a day in conversation with a woman, Glenn felt more awkward than normal the entire afternoon.

“I don't mind the change of scenery,” Maci said near the end of the day. Helen had brought in dinner from Hopewell’s: meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and broccoli drowned in butter. “Don't get me wrong, the Bureau's a great place to work, but they've got their politics like everyplace else.” She jiggled a hand toward Glenn, herself, and back to Glenn. “We don’t work a lot of cases like this. It's always teams and task forces, a lot of coordinating. All day, since I got here, I feel like I can breathe.” She leaned back in her chair. “You haven't told me your theory. About the McCutcheons. You must have one. I can reel off statistics, but you know the town. Strictly off the record. Where do you think they are?”

Glenn revisited that shrinking feeling he got in the McCutcheons' house. “Their car's gone. Their boat's gone. Some of the guys at the mill said they liked to fish at Mississinewa Lake. Over in Miami County. Sheriff's office there looked and couldn't find the car or the boat. I wonder if they could have drove off the road somewhere. State troopers are looking out for them, but...you figure in all the rural roads in the state, dirt roads and whatnot, there's a lot of mileage no one's had time to look at.”

“If that's true...you know they would be deceased. After that much time.”

Glenn nodded.

The time had gotten away from them and it was nearly dark. They wrapped up for the day and Glenn gave Maci directions back to the boarding house.

He sat in his car a bit and pondered the night. His mind was going in too many directions and there was about only one place he could go at night when he couldn't stand to be alone. He drove to a small trailer park north of town, on the other side of SR 24. There were only fifteen units arranged around an oval, but a few of them were double-wides and they'd been there a good thirty years without being carried off by a tornado.

Glenn knew the routine. He parked along the main road outside the lot so it looked as if he could be visiting anyone. Walked down the dirt road that connected the trailers. When he got to Brenda's unit he looked for the red scarf tied to a railing at the door halfway down the length of the mobile home. Some nights the scarf wasn't there and he kept on walking back to his car. Tonight was clear and he tapped on the metal door. A few moths and gnats flitted around the outside light that only half-illuminated her aging Dodge pickup.

Brenda opened the door and waved him in. Still dressed in scrubs from her nurse's job, she glanced outside to make sure no one was in sight. What she did was no big secret among the neighbors; she still knew better than to flaunt the arrangement.

The interior felt like a dollhouse; everything in a mobile home seemed smaller and more fragile to Glenn than regular homes. A hallway, only wide enough to fit one person, went left and right off the main living room. To the right, a boy about kindergarten age stood in a doorway rubbing his eyes, backed by the light from a television.

“You go back to bed, Sammy,” Brenda said. “Close your door now.” Her voice was in the early stages of a coarseness brought on by smoking. He never asked but figured her to be in her early forties. Glenn followed her to the left and into her bedroom. To Glenn, she said, “The TV helps him sleep.” She gave him a good-natured poke in the chest. “And it's harder for him to hear if things get noisy on this end.”

Brenda was what some townsfolk called “sturdy.” She was a good six inches shorter than Glenn and had thick brown hair to her shoulders. Glenn felt grateful her bedroom only had the one small lamp on the nightstand; it was hard enough for him to work up the nerve to visit without being in full light. A plain wood cross hung over the full-size bed. A small black-and-white TV on the dresser was turned on with the volume all the way down. A poster thumbtacked over the dresser said “California” in oversized letters; each letter had an illustration inside it: a redwood, a beach, a waterfall.

She took a breath mint from a tin on the dresser and undressed while she talked. As many times as Glenn had been here, he still grew tongue-tied and mostly listened to Brenda. “I don't have a shift tomorrow, so we can take as long as you want. I tell you what, those doctors I work for are a real pain in the ass sometimes.”

He studied his feet as she stood naked before him. His experience with women as limited as it was, he could only compare her to Angie. If he was going to be truthful about it, he considered Angie prettier with her clothes on, a trophy he hadn’t been handsome enough or slick-talking enough to earn, whereas he found genuine comfort in Brenda's more generous figure. He wanted to look at every part of her at once, and finding himself overwhelmed sometimes had to look away.

“Always the shy one,” she chuckled. “Come on, let's get you undressed.”

*****

LATER, they drank Cokes and sat on the stoop on the back of the trailer. Brenda wore a robe and slippers and smoked. Fireflies lit up the humid evening. Summer was nearly in full force. She had turned up the TV enough that they could barely hear it through her open bedroom window.

Mr. Barbadoro: Now, between July of 1984 and 1986 when the U.S. government funding resumed, you spent approximately $19 million for arms and ammunition, correct?

Mr. Calero: Correct, sir.

Mr. Barbadoro: Prior to July of 1984, had you had any experience in purchasing weapons?

Mr. Calero: No, sir.

Mr. Barbadoro: How did you determine what arms to buy and how much to pay for them?

Mr. Calero: Well, I knew what was being used and we had prepared before, with the CIA, a budget, which listed all the materials that we were going to buy with the new funding...

“I do not understand all that mess,” Brenda said. She flicked an ash off her cigarette. “I was a Reagan supporter before. I mean, I never voted or nothing. I liked him and all, but... All those things was going on and he don’t remember it?” She shook her head. “Seems like nobody's who they're supposed to be. The older Sammie gets, the more I worry about how crazy the world's getting.”

“How's he getting on these days?”

“He's so smart,” she smiled. “I can't believe how smart he is. I think he's catching on to his momma's night job. I got to start being more careful. Not like this town's got much else for a single mother. I tell you what, Glenn, I'm getting close. Between this and my nursing paycheck, I'll get to California. Me and Sammie, soon as I got enough saved. I'm not giving up like my mom and dad did. My son's going to have better chances than I ever had.”

“Whatever happened to your folks?” Glenn asked. “I never hear you talk about them.”

She gave him a look. “Glenn, you're a nice guy, but you don't have a clue sometimes.” She threw down the cigarette butt and ground it out with her foot. “You want another Coke?”

He took in a deep breath and let it out slow. He did. But he thought about the little boy sleeping with the TV on inside and decided he'd imposed too much already. He stood and removed his wallet from a back pocket. Counted out some bills and handed them to her.

She separated one of the bills and tucked it into Glenn's front pocket. “You're law enforcement. You know you get a discount.”

He'd argued with her before and always lost. Walking away, he said, “Thanks, Brenda.”

“I'm happy to see you, Glenn. You don't make me feel cheap, like some do.”

“Thanks for not asking about the McCutcheons. It's all anyone else wants to talk about.”

She dismissed the thought with a wave of her hand. “You're not here to talk shop. I know you're doing the best you can to find them.”

4

Glenn picked up Maci at the boarding house next morning and they took the cruiser to visit Missy McCutcheon's uncle.

“You were right about the breakfast,” she smiled, dark eyes hidden by sunglasses. “That was seriously decadent. Eggs, bacon, toast with jam. Real strawberry jam, from a local farm. I usually just grab some yogurt on the way to the office. And it was so quiet. I slept with the window open. I can't even open the windows in my apartment. Mattress is a little old, but I'm not complaining.”

“Miz Oberlin's a nice lady. She's been all alone there for years, I'm sure she's glad for the conversation.”

“She's very interesting,”Maci said. “She’s seen a lot of local history. I guess you know that. Said she worries sometimes, if big industry comes to town like everyone seems to hope, that it’ll turn into a big parking lot and ruin the place. She told me about the change she’s seen, good and bad. You know the Miami Indians used to have a good-sized community here? But the Great White Machine couldn't stand them living off the land and forced them to play ball or move away.” She lifted her sunglasses to look at him directly. “That's not aimed at you.”

He shook his head to show he wasn't offended. “I heard bits and pieces of that. Some Miami are still around, mostly over near Peru.”

Driving north from town on the Concord turnpike, Glenn looked at the fields and forests and mulled over the map in his head.

“Do you think this uncle, Mr. Crandall, might really know something?” Maci flipped through a file of papers she held in her lap.

Glenn shrugged, right hand on the steering wheel, his left arm leaning on the open window. “Sounds like they weren't too close. None of the people we interviewed even thought to name him. Can’t guarantee it, but I think I might know this fellow. Or, I might have seen him, at any rate. If it's who I think it is, he had what you might call a reputation with the kids in town. This was years ago. His kind, it's hard to imagine him having any relations. Sure never knew he was family to the McCutcheons.”

Missy's uncle, Crandall, occupied a wood-frame shack with peeling white paint. Two windows were covered with plywood. A rusty pickup sat in misery in the sandy stretch that passed for a driveway. Shrubs and trees, all looking to have suffered some malady, grew up in random spots. Forest stretched off behind and to the east. A hand-lettered sign nailed to the trunk of a long-dead tree said Trespassers will be shot. Helen had confirmed with the phone company Crandall had no service; showing up at the door was all they could do.

Glenn parked as close to the house as he could get, behind the pickup. He gave the horn a couple of taps. As they stepped out of the vehicle, he yelled, “Mr. Crandall! Sheriff's office! Just want to ask you a few questions!”

Once they were fully out of the car, a shot rang out. Gravel and dust flew up not far from Glenn's feet. He nearly tripped running around behind the car. Faster than he could blink, Maci crouched behind the rear bumper, sidearm drawn and ready.

“No trespassers!” The voice from the house was fragile but determined.

“You all right?” Maci asked.

Glenn leaned against the back of the car and caught his breath. “I think it's rock salt. He puts it in shotgun shells. That's the way I remember it.”

Maci frowned at him. Looked over the trunk of the cruiser at the house and asked, “How confident are you that he's alone? Other than the voices in his head?”

Tight-lipped, Glenn shook his head. A near-miss with rock salt was more trouble than he'd encountered on the job in years. Better late than never, he put his hand on the butt of his pistol. He shouted, “Mr. Crandall! It's the sheriff's office! Just here to ask a few questions!”

A breeze disrupted the leaves while the old man deliberated. “All right. You can approach the door. Don't come no further.”

Maci holstered her weapon. As much as he hated to go first, Glenn told her, “You come behind me and maybe keep your ID out. He's old fashioned, not a big fan of government to begin with. He might be a bit particular about a...well...”

“He doesn't want some uppity Black FBI woman taking away his freedom?”

Glenn nodded. “We're a little behind the times here.”

“Don't worry. I promise not to pull any habeas corpus shit on him.”

Glenn was too busy worrying about more shotgun blasts to recall what habeas corpus even meant. He held his hands out, stood, and walked toward the front door. Crandall stood behind an aluminum storm door with screen in the top half. Maci came behind and to the left, holding on to her identification with her left hand. Glenn introduced himself and Maci.

“I don't need to talk to you without a warrant or just cause.” Crandall looked to be in his seventies at least. His eyes were sunk in and his head was partly covered by insubstantial clumps of white hair. He hadn’t shaved for several days. He lowered the shotgun and directed most of his visual distaste in Maci's direction.

“You're absolutely correct, sir,” Maci said with the most casual tone she could muster. “You are not required to cooperate with us in any way. I'll just make a note that you prefer to meet with the entire task force in Indianapolis. You'll only need to go there for two days, three at the outside. At the government's expense, of course.”

Crandall stared at her. His mouth and eyes permanently angled down from a lifetime of scowling.

“I reckon a minute or two won't hurt none.”

“You're not a suspect, Mr. Crandall,” Glenn said through the screen. “Nothing like that. We're hoping you might be able to help us. You're Missy McCutcheon's uncle, is that right? Crandall was her maiden name?”

“Not her uncle. Different generation. Great-uncle, I reckon. What of it?”

“We're trying to locate her. No one's seen or heard from her in more than a week. Bill and Hank are missing, too.”

Crandall cough-snorted. “You think they'd come up here? What for?”

“You ever talk to them? You have any idea where they might have gone to?”

“Never had much to do with me. I'm old. Happy to be left in peace.”

Glenn studied the ground at his feet, the rusty edges of the door, the frays in the screen.

“I ain't talked to them in ages,” Crandall said. “Years, maybe.” He tilted his head. Remembering, or deciding not to trap himself. “Her husband was up here, guess it was a week or two back.”

“Just visiting? Did he seem all right to you?”

“Asking if I had any family pictures. They was going through old family documents and thought I might have pictures of their grandparents or such. I don’t tend to hold on to them kinds of things, but I had a couple down in some drawers. I let him have them and he left. Seemed normal enough to me.”

Glenn stroked his chin. Mulled over what he'd heard.

Crandall heaved out a breath. “Me and her granddaddy did some business now and then. Your granddad, too, as I recall. Back when I first bought this land. Me and him didn't see eye to eye. I come here and they stayed there. Didn't have much to do with one another after that.”

“This is a fine piece of land you have, Mr. Crandall,” Maci said. “You’ve owned this a long time, haven’t you?”

Crandall scowled at her.

“Since before the War, wasn’t it?” Glenn asked. He shifted around to look across the countryside. “You've seen a lot of history here, I imagine.”

“Privacy's what I come here for. Whole damn country got too liberal. Sommersville along with it. Some of us tried to hold ground. Keep out the undesirables.” His eyes flickered to Maci and back. “Those other Crandalls got took in by all this,” he sneered, “permissiveness. Lost their stomach, you ask me. We'd have-”

It occurred to him the ones standing in front of him might have been of the permissive variety and he shut his mouth.

Glenn pointed to a chicken wire fence that ran across the yard and into the wooded area behind the house. Rusted metal No trespassing signs hung from it at fifty foot intervals. “Just to be sure we don't trespass on your property again. That's the fence around your whole parcel?”

“Yeah. Ain't nothing on my land you need to see. Don't be coming 'round here without no warrant again. I ain't seen those McCutcheons and no idea where they might be off to.”

“I understand, Mr. Crandall, we sure appreciate your help. You know who owns the neighboring land, by any chance?”

“State owns it. Big chunk of it.”

Glenn nodded, lost in thought looking the length of the fence-line.

“No one supposed to be trespassing there, neither,” Crandall sniped. “They don't keep as watchful about it as me.”

“All right, sir. Thank you, again. We'll be sure not to trouble you again. You, uh, you want us to contact you if Missy turns up?”

Crandall had already slammed the door. He watched them leave through a narrow side window, glass as fogged with age as him.

*****

MACI SAID she wanted to discuss the case outside the office. “No offense, Glenn,” she looked toward the office where Sheriff Howard was nodding off on his couch. “This is not the most conducive place for getting work done.”

They bought dinner at Hopewell's deli. The store got noticeably quieter when they walked in. A few folks looked as if they'd swallowed a bug. When Maci ordered her food, Rhonda at the counter talked louder and put more effort into enunciation, like she was dealing with a foreign-language speaker. Glenn did the math in his head, adding up the looks they got and factoring in the new rumors it would stir up, and suggested they take the food and paperwork to his house, the only place he could think of where they would be free of busybodies.

The dog looked about to lose her mind whenever Glenn came home and went doubly mad when Maci took off her shoes and kneeled down to scratch its ears and say, “What a good girl!” over and over. The dog made a game of running behind Maci, who pretended to be surprised before turning around and repeating the ear-scratching routine.

“What's her name?” Maci asked. Glenn told her the dog's origin while they took food containers from paper bags. “You're all right, Glenn,” she said. “I don't know many people who would take in a strange dog like that.”

Maci took one look at the aged particle-board dining table, littered with Hopewell's bags from previous nights, and looked at the sliding door into the backyard. “Let's sit outside. I love the fresh night air here.”

They sat at the plastic table and chair, alongside a chair Glenn carried out from the kitchen, that had been there as long as Glenn could remember, where the Old Man had smoked and listened to baseball games on the radio, after ordering Glenn to mow the lawn and then complaining about why he was taking so long. Only one chair because the Old Man never cared if anyone else sat. Glenn flinched his head at a remembered smack in the face.

“Can’t remember when I spent any amount of time out here.” Glenn looked around the yard, already warming up to Maci’s suggestion.

They covered the flimsy table with sandwiches, plastic cups of macaroni salad, apple sauce, coleslaw, and green bean casserole, and foam cups with iced tea. The dog alternated between sniffing around the yard and sitting at their feet hoping for scraps. The Watkins, the ancient couple next door who had moved in as retirees twenty years ago, stepped outside to assess the situation. The old couple waved from a distance, whispered to each other, and hobbled back indoors. Glenn hadn't considered how awkward he would feel having company, he was so used to being alone in the house with ghosts of the past.

“Is there really a task force?” Glenn asked.

“No,” Maci said. “It's not even an official Bureau investigation. Things are just a little hot in the Chicago office right now. I like the way you handled Crandall. He told you more than he wanted to.”

“Something the sheriff likes to say. People get antsy about silence. Keep quiet and sometimes they'll go right on talking.”

“There's some context in what Crandall said, but I believe him on the main point,” she said. “He doesn't know where the McCutcheons are.”

Glenn nodded as he spooned out some macaroni salad. “I believe him about them not wanting to associate with him.”

“You said he had a reputation. Let me guess.” She made an angry face and held her hand up with thumb and finger in a pointed gun gesture. “Get off my lawn.”

“It's a big lawn. He's owned that land long as I can remember. The Salem River runs through a piece of it. Kids used to play out there. Fishing and whatnot, just cooling off in the summer. He'd run them off every time. I was one of them. That's when I learned about the rock salt.”

“Lucky he didn't remember you,” Maci chuckled through a bite of chicken salad sandwich.

“Fence goes all around the property, acres of it. It rusted and fell down in places. We'd go through it and he'd run us off.”

“Were you as creeped out as I was by that permissiveness bit?” she asked.

Glen hedged with embarrassment. “Klan was big in Indiana back in the day. I mean, before my old man's time. I can imagine Crandall being sympathetic with an operation like that.”

“Didn't the McCutcheons have a boat? A small fishing boat, yes? Small enough to navigate the river?

“River gets pretty shallow in places, but a boat that size could make it,” Glenn said. “Private citizens already looked over parts of the river. I'd be surprised if anyone's been on Crandall's land, though.”

“And in order to search there... I know it's a long shot, but even if we found anything... Without a warrant, it could be inadmissible.”

Glenn frowned. “Hold on.” He went back in the house and rummaged around in some kitchen drawers. Came out holding a torn and faded paper map folded up accordion-style.

“It was my folks' map,” Glenn said. “Nothing much changed here since then.” Maci moved the food containers aside so Glenn could lay the map on the table. He puzzled over it a bit, running his finger down the aged paper. He jabbed a finger at it.

“What is it?” Maci asked.

“Look here,” he said. “This is Crandall's property. Like he said, most of the land around him is public land. Well, the state owns it, but it's not for public use. I guess they sell rights to lumber companies and such.”

Maci traced a line on the map where Glenn had indicated. “And this is where the river runs through the property?”

“See there? River's on the state side of the property line. It's not Crandall's land at all. Those No Trespassing signs, they were facing into Crandall's lot. Those aren’t Crandall’s signs, they’re the state’s. Or else he’s got them pointed the wrong way.”

Maci sat back in her chair. “Those aren't to keep people off Crandall's land. They’re to keep people off the state land.”

“All those years,” Glenn said, “he was running people off the state's land, not his. You think he knew that?”

“We can search public land without a warrant. It's a long shot, but we can look. Nice detective work, Deputy.”

They ate their food in silence for several minutes. Maci made some attempt to get the dog to sit on command, but it got excited every time she talked to it and that got it jumping around wiggling its hind end. Night took its regular stroll across the land and fireflies flashed on and off over the lawn. A distant owl sang a pattern of whos.

“I’m a city girl, born and raised,” Maci said. “But I’ve seen my share of small towns. You know this town. People here don't just disappear. Right? They don't travel without telling the neighbors. We both know what the odds are. The statistics say it’s either a car crash, like you said, or someone killed that family. Robbery, a jealous husband, whatever. You do know that?”

Glenn stared into the darkness. “I been in law enforcement...counting the academy...I been in law enforcement fifteen years. All that time, I never knew anyone who was murdered. I didn't know the McCutcheons much, but...” He shook his head. “This town's got a long history of being let down. If they are dead...”

Maci sipped her iced tea, ice cubes making a muffled clinking sound against the Styrofoam, and raised a hand as if to caress a firefly that flickered nearby.

“It's weird,” she said, “a city like Chicago, or even Indianapolis, has more history, more people, more stuff that happened. But the smaller towns have the hardest time escaping history, don’t you think? Here's a guy, Crandall, you said he bought his land before World War II? So, the 1930s. You said it yourself, the Klan basically controlled the state in the twenties. Illinois, too, but not like here. We treat it like ancient history, but here's a guy who lived through it. It's not that far back. It's still here, even, plenty of people like Crandall are still around. He mentioned your grandfather, is he still alive?”

“No. My old man's still around. Neither one of them talked about their past much. I could imagine my grandpa going along with the Klan. Maybe even my dad. Not that he was big on joining groups, but he might have been sympathetic to them.”

Maci dismissed the matter with a wave of her hand. “Bureau’s record’s not what you’d call spotless when it comes to the Klan. They were more what you might call collaborators in the early days. Prohibition, organized crime, race, immigration, it was all related. Seems different today.” She tilted her head back and looked at the sky. “Would you look at all those stars.” She kept her face turned toward the heavens. “You ever read up on some of the high-profile cases from those days? Right here in Indiana, some of them. Dillinger, Machine Gun Kelly, Baby Face Nelson. How'd we get to a place where plain old thieves and murderers sound like the good old days? I mean, we’ve still got organized crime in Chicago – there was a guy, just last year, got shot in the head on Belmont Avenue, supposed to be a union guy but he was tight with one of the families – but the real crooks today are like the Mafia on steroids. Now the CIA's selling drugs from Latin America to raise cash for weapons that go right back to where the drugs are coming from.”

Glenn appreciated the darkness covering up his wide-eyed look. It was one thing for people on television to speculate about government corruption. Hearing it from an actual FBI agent was another matter.

“People say Dillinger passed through here once,” Glenn said. “But...this town's always lived on talk that never amounts to much.”

“You ever think about going to Indianapolis? Or the State Police? They're always looking for people. You obviously know what you're doing.”

The long pause gave the impression that maybe Glenn knew exactly what he was doing. The dog romped around the yard, trying to sniff at fireflies that turned off before she caught up to them.

“It's not the kind of place people leave,” Glenn said. “Boys want to get factory or mechanics jobs in Kokomo or someplace. One of the early large-production cars was invented in Kokomo, fellow named Haynes. They’re still making cars there. Girls want to be wives and mothers. It's rare someone wants to be a doctor or lawyer. Most don't try to leave, and the handful that do, mostly they don't come back.”

Those that leave, regardless of the means of departure, was the unspoken sentiment. They both thought of what that meant for the missing family.

“It's getting late,” Maci stood. “That was some seriously good deli food.” She began gathering the empty food containers.

Glenn waved her off. “I got it. You okay finding your way back to the boarding house?”

She nodded. “Tomorrow we'll look for that missing boat. And you,” she stooped over to pet the dog, “we're going to come up with a proper name for you.”

*****

GLENN LIKED wearing the uniform, not because it earned him respect in town, but because it saved him the trouble of figuring out what clothes to wear. When Maci showed up wearing a baseball cap, hiking boots, khaki shorts, and a button-down short-sleeve top, she looked him up and down and asked, “You going to be able to keep up?”

Not being certain, he kept quiet and drove them back out toward Crandall's place on the turnpike. The dog rode in the back seat, turning to look out one side window and then the other. Scattered cumulus clouds ambled across a sky of glorious blue. A hawk floated toward the horizon. They turned off the main road and parked on the side of a gravel road. The river ran north-south a short distance away. They each put on a pair of mirrored sunglasses. Glenn carried a newer paper map from the office.

“Areas south of here have been searched pretty good by civilians,” he pointed right, then left. “North is what we thought was Crandall's land but really state-owned, according to the map.”

The terrain along the river was uneven but passable. The dog repeatedly ran ahead until it was nearly out of sight, then returned to them. She ran through the shallowest sections of river and gave a vigorous shake, throwing water drops twenty feet or more. Farmland quickly turned to forest that became more dense the farther they walked. Blue jays and wrens and finches chirped and squawked. The river was silent in places and burbled over rocks and fallen tree trunks in others. The shore terrain varied from steep, disrupted by tree roots, to level, covered with leaves and gravel. A fence was always nearby, not always visible through the vegetation, with No Trespassing signs. Glenn began to sweat through his uniform.

“It's not deep enough for much to pass through,” Maci said. “How far is it like this?”

“Miles,” Glenn said. “Back in the day, there was talk the state would turn it into a canal. Good many of the older buildings in town went up then, everyone thinking we’d be a canal stop between Chicago and Indianapolis. Never happened. Canal speculators went bust and got bought out by another round of speculators. You might say that's our history. Whatever's supposed to happen never does.”

They rested in a shady spot. The river turned silent and they only heard the portentous scream of cicadas.

“A buddy and me used to play in the river as kids,” Glenn said, more to escape that relentless sound than anything. “Catching fish, throwing rocks. This one time, we piled up rocks and mud across a narrow piece of the river. Thought we'd built a damn. Took a few minutes for it all to get washed away.” He took off his sunglasses and wiped sweat off his forehead. “River might be the only thing that ever really leaves this town.”

They took up walking again.

“You ever been to Belize?” Maci asked. Glenn confessed he’d never heard of the place. “It’s this little country south of Mexico. I don’t get to travel much, but I went there a few years ago.” She put thumb and forefinger to the shell necklace she always seemed to wear. “I got this down there. Super friendly people. Hotter than hell, but great hiking. I hiked some rivers there, not that different from this, just the wildlife was more exotic. There’s this island in the Caribbean, they call them Cayes, you pronounce it like ‘keys’ but spelled c-a-y-e-s. Caye Caulker. No cars, just a dirt path, and you can walk one end of the island to the other. You should see it, Glenn, it’s the most peaceful place I’ve ever been. And Mayan ruins, some of them were built a couple thousand years ago. Can you imagine that? These pyramids just rise out of the jungle like magic. Compare that to these trees,” she thumped the trunk of a maple as they walked past. “Look at the trunk size. What are the bigger ones, maybe fifty or a hundred years old? These trees are older than us, but still babies compared to when the Mayans built their pyramids.”

Maci snapped her fingers and pointed at the dog, whipping its tail back and forth as it sniffed at every leaf and stick. “There’s a good name for her. One of the Mayan ruins down there is called Caracol. It’s Spanish for snail. Isn’t this dog the complete opposite of that?” The dog sensed they were watching it and ran toward them with curious eyes. Maci leaned forward and snuggled the dog’s head. “How about Cara? What do you think of that name?”

The dog didn’t express an opinion. Glenn had no objection, but naming the dog seemed to be a more permanent arrangement than he’d thought about. He fumbled around in his head over this Belize place and the idea of abandoned ancient structures compared to trees older than his grandparents and this town where the past never seemed to die.

The dog charged ahead again. They didn't need to hike far. The dog saw it first and hollered.

“There,” Maci pointed. An aluminum fishing boat with molded seats and an outboard motor lay halfway on a section of gravel. The rear half bobbed in a current so gentle and persistent, with enough centuries, it could carve out a grand canyon. The dog sniffed around the hull. Only nature understood what, if anything, it remembered.

Glenn stood with head bowed while Maci pulled latex gloves from a pocket and examined the meager belongings in the boat. A plastic cooler with water from melted ice. A fishing tackle box and a tool box, both well stocked. Plastic cushions for the seats.

Glenn took off his hat and looked anywhere but the abandoned boat that put them one step closer to a lost cause.

It’s night and the stableboy does his best to stay out of harm's way. He cowers in a shadowy corner of the shack, away from the flickering lamplight and the potential wrath of the old man. He has a sister only a few years older, a little blond girl who escapes the old man's hand thanks to her mother, the only useful piece of parenting to ever go on in the home. The sister sneaks him bits of food every chance she gets, all that’s keep him from being skin and bones. Defends him at the dinner table, if you can call those fatty scraps dinner, where the boy's not allowed to sit. Praises his hard work to deaf ears. She does her best to clean him up, picking burrs off his threadbare clothes and wiping the dirt off his teary face. She hums a nameless tune, the only music that ever graces the boy's ears in his puny length of life. He's never fully at rest, jumping at every noise, knowing the next one could be the old man's fist, and the universe's frigid ambivalence his only constant companion.

Glenn jerked his head. Maci rested a hand on his arm. “You still with me?”

He screwed his eyes shut; opened them and looked around the forest to reorient himself. The cicadas had relented enough to become background noise.

“Sorry.” He inhaled a full breath and held it for several seconds. “Nothing in the boat?”

“Nothing useful.” She shook her head, not convinced he had fully returned. “Maybe we can get some prints. The ground around it hasn't been disturbed recently. No way to tell if they left it here or if it drifted.”

The trees and underbrush were too dense to fit a vehicle through. They took turns towing the boat by hand downstream. The dog needed no instruction and walked alongside them. Just as with her reflexes at Crandall's house, Maci's strength surprised Glenn. He tried to get his mind off the twin distractions of the FBI agent and the boy in his dreams, and stay focused on getting the boat back to town and figuring out their next step.

*****

A LITTLE TIME had allowed Maci’s name and title to circulate and the whispers and shoulder nudges were more deliberate that evening when they went in Hopewell’s to pick up dinner. Glenn was too embarrassed to react and Maci seemed to ignore it. Later, in the car, Maci said, “I’ll never be happy about it, but I’m used to getting stares. Plenty of racists in Chicago. I live in what you might call a mixed race building, and some of the older white residents give me the stink-eye when they see me in the lobby.”

They brought the food back to the house and sat outside again, testing out the dog’s new name while she sniffed at the variety of smells. He hadn't expected the McCutcheons' outcome to be dragged out so long. The longer the dog lived under his roof, the more natural it seemed to have her around.

“I talked with the sheriff this morning,” Maci said. “Early. He came in to help out Miss Oberlin move some boxes and stayed for breakfast. That's the first time I’ve seen him,” she held up her hands in an air-quotes gesture, “well enough to have a real conversation. We talked a little about the case, but he mostly asked me about my career at the Bureau. He's a really nice guy. Very sharp when he's...you know. I get why he's the sheriff.”

“I hear he goes there once a week or so,” Glenn said. “Checks in on Miz Oberlin, see if she needs any help. Can't always see it, but he cares about the town, does his best to stay in touch with what's going on and things he can do to help.”

“After he left, she talked about what a good man he is. That got her talking about how many people she’s watched grow up over the years. Including you.” She grinned. “She expects, when the sheriff retires, you’ll take the job. She’s fine with that but isn’t sure the rest of the town gives you a fair chance.”

“I’d just as soon the sheriff keep the job.”

“I have to ask. What happened? The sheriff, I mean. He hasn't always been like this.”

“Longer than I've been a deputy, he has. He's gotten worse, but there was a time, sheriff was all the town needed. Most days it still is, other than for appearances’ sake. Something went wrong for him years ago. No one much wants to talk about it. All I ever heard is he had a wife and kid. Something happened to them. He never was able to make peace with it.”

“A good cop whose only scandal is self-destruction,” Maci said. “So the town keeps reelecting him sheriff. The reliable deputy holds up the front office in a town where a serious crime occurs, what, every few decades. I'm not trying to sound like a carpetbagger, but has anyone tried an intervention?”

Glenn barely noticed the dog licking barbecue sauce off his fingers. “My mom had cancer. I was still in high school. Doctors couldn't help her. Stage IV.”

“There's no Stage V,” Maci sighed. “I'm sorry.”

“There was no money to pay for expensive care. She went into the local rehab center, where all the old folks without insurance go when their family can't take care of them. Didn't have much in the way of friends. She wasn't a church-goer. Sheriff went to see her. At least twice a week, no matter what, he was there. Me and my old man didn't show up. He did.”

He scratched the dog's ears. Thunder rumbled from an isolated storm on the horizon.

“Me and my folks didn't get on much. I didn't lose a lot of sleep over her being sick. Last time I saw her was a couple of days before she passed. I was at the academy by then. She'd about wasted away to nothing. I don't know what the two of them talked about, but she told me she regretted some thing's she'd done over the years. I about fell over. Sorry wasn't a word you'd ever hear in this house. There it was. I don't know that it made me feel better, but any man could turn her around, he's got my vote.”

He drank from a cup of iced tea. This was already more than he talked in a normal day.

“It was the sheriff talked me into going to the academy. I wanted to go, but didn't have the money. My Old Man sure didn't have it, and it wouldn't have mattered if he did. It was the sheriff figured out the financial aid and showed me how I could do it working part-time. I owe him a lot.” He felt another round of gratitude for the darkness hiding his face. “Sorry, I don't know what got me talking about that.”

Maci looked at the stars and changed the subject to distract from Glenn's embarrassment. “I know I said it already, but all those stars, my Lord. You can even see the Milky Way.” She pointed to the hazy stretch of sky that represented a world so vast, Glenn found it easier to think about it in old science-fiction movies.

“I keep thinking about that trip to Belize I told you about. That was the only other time I saw this many stars. Out on that island, you could even see more than this. I love Chicago, I’m lucky to live there, but Belize, man, that was a life-changer. I took up meditation while I was there. I'd dabbled in it a bit, but something about that experience, I wanted to get more serious about it. You ever try it?”

“That's all over my head,” Glenn chuckled. “It's not the kind of thing that takes hold in a town like Sommersville.”

“Are you kidding? This is the perfect spot for meditation.” She shifted her chair around to face him. “Studying people is what I do for a living, Glenn. You've got a lot more on your mind than you let on.”

He studied the darkness.

“Look, it's easy to start. Just sit still, so you're comfortable. You can close your eyes or leave them open. Focus on your breath. Don't try to control your breathing, just pay attention to it.”

“Aren't you supposed to turn off all your thoughts or something? Make your brain go silent?”

“Good luck with that,” she said. “You'll never turn off your thoughts. Your mind's going to do its thing. But when you feel yourself getting distracted,” she raised her hands far apart and moved them together so the palms touched. “just go back to focusing on your breath. Try not to attach any emotion to it. You will attach emotion to it, it’s human nature. Just don’t beat yourself up over it. That's the easiest way to start. Long term, you can get into transcendental meditation or other directions. But if you do that simple exercise for fifteen or twenty minutes a day, you'll see a difference in your life. I guarantee it.”

“I always thought people who meditated were...I don’t know, different,” Glenn said. “Shaved their heads, wore robes and things.”

“You need to get out of town more. I know the stereotypes. It's not all dreamy peace and love. Intense meditators stir up a lot of emotions, reliving past events, feeling hurt from all the injustice in the world. I've had out-of-body experiences, I really believed I was observing myself from overhead. But it connects you with life more...directly.” She clenched her hands into fists, then opened her hands as if discarding an imaginary object. “You can process through stuff and let go of it. It’s hard to explain until you try it.”

She turned her chair back and sipped from her ice tea.

Finally, Glenn approached the questions that had been on their minds all day. “You think somebody stole that boat? Rode around and left it out there?”

“I’m not sure it matters.” She fidgeted with the straw in her drink cup. “That’s the only lead we’ve got. If the McCutcheons went out on the boat and had some kind of accident, they’re still out there. If someone stole the boat – hard to believe, if the neighbors are as nosy as you say – there’s a clue out there to whoever did it. Either way, we need to search that whole area. As long as we’re on state land, we’re fine. And if old man Crandall takes shots at us on state land, then we’ll have cause to search his property.”

5

The next morning they repeated their route out to the gravel road off the turnpike. Glenn prepared better this time; he dug up a couple of canteens from the supply room and filled them with water before they left. He brought a felt marker and the map with a big X showing where they found the boat. Maci carried a 35mm camera, Bureau property and a good deal nicer than what the sheriff’s office had.

They parked the car and the dog ran ahead, kicking up dust from the gravel road as she did. Cumulus clouds grew toward the west like mountains.

Moving in silence, before long they reached the bend in the river where the boat had been. A breeze helped cool them but nudged the clouds closer and taller. The map showed Crandall’s land on the west side of the river and state-owned forest to the east. The fence with No Trespassing signs was on the east side of the river.

“Fence should be over there,” Glenn fumbled with the map and pointed to the west. “It’s always been like that, long as I can remember. How come nobody ever said anything?”

Maci shrugged while she climbed away from the river and pulled at a damaged section of fence. “Maybe nobody noticed. Maybe they didn’t care. Or maybe somebody knew and didn’t want to say anything.”

She ducked under the fence while Glenn considered that. He pulled at the loose fencing to let Cara through and followed behind. The forest became more dense, weeds and shrubs and small trees growing up under the full canopy of sturdy oaks, maples, and walnut trees.

“I take back my comment about the uniform.” Maci studied scratches on her legs from thorns and nettle.

They walked ten feet apart, advancing slowly, scanning the ground, rocks, and vegetation. The dog nosed along after one scent or another but showed no inclination to favor a particular direction. The shadowed green of the forest canopy stretched over them like a living roof.

They looked for signs of recent disturbance, a footpath through the weeds or broken branches. Scattered bits of trash looked too old to be of interest, an occasional rusted can or molded paper wrapper. Glenn marked the map to reflect the area they searched.

Thunder rumbled, far off at first and gradually closer. The forest was already heavy with shadow and grew darker. A solid breeze whipped up the leaves. Glenn nearly doubled over when they heard a gunshot that was really a crack of thunder.

“Sorry,” he said. A rain shower barely penetrated the forest growth. Drops beating against the leaves overhead immersed them in the sound of a waterfall. Booms of thunder increased with the intensity of the rain and enough precipitation got through that they took shelter next to a broad oak tree with branches low enough to fully cover them.

“Didn’t even think to check the forecast,” Maci said. She looked at Glenn, pale and hunched over beside her. “Oh, hey, you all right?”

“Yeah,” he grumbled. “Storms always make me kind of nervous. We get tornadoes through here.”

Cara wandered the vicinity and shook from time to time to throw off the drops collecting on her fur. The storm passed after only a few minutes and Glenn stood straighter as the rain eased off. Random drips bounced off the leaves and toward the river they heard a faint sound of running water, like an open storm drain.

“There’s no falls or rapids through here,” Glenn said. “None I’ve heard about, anyway.”

They veered back to the river, to an area a good half a mile north of where they’d found the boat. About ten yards inland they found an abrupt hillside with trees balanced on the edge. A limestone outcropping directed the recent rainfall over the hill in a miniature waterfall. Cara put her tail down, nose to the ground, and edged toward an opening roughly ten by ten feet. She gave a half-hearted bark and looked at Glenn for guidance.

“Any idea what this is?” Maci asked. Weeds and shrubs had grown around the opening enough to obscure it from a distance.

Glenn shook his head. “Never been out this far.”

Maci pointed to the left of the opening. Several cigarette butts lay on the ground and two sets of boot prints in the soft earth hadn’t been disrupted by the recent rainfall. She photographed the prints and put one of the cigarette butts in an evidence bag. “Can’t ever get decent fingerprints off these,” she said, “but won’t hurt to try.” The boot prints led to a growth of ferns damaged by recent foot traffic.

Glenn stepped inside the cave and shined his flashlight around. The penlight hardly went far enough to see a series of crumbling frames made of rotting wood beams. Maci added her own light, equally small, to scan the interior. “Almost looks like a mine tunnel,” she said.

“It’s too dark.” Glenn frowned into the tunnel with no visible end. “We can’t go back there with these lights.”

“No,” Maci said. “But look.” She pointed again to the prints. “We do need to go in there. It’s not that far from the boat. Not like we’ve got any better leads.”

Glenn sighed. They traced their steps back to the river, then to the car. On the way, Maci said, “You never heard anyone talk about a cave, or a mine? There’s plenty of mining goes on in the Midwest.”

“Mining was talked about over the years,” Glenn said. “A lot of things got talked about. Never heard anything come of it. I know a guy, he might remember something. He knows this land better than anyone else I know.”

They chewed over the idea of talking to old man Crandall again. There would be no way to connect him to the boat; the river wasn’t on his land and his own property was so big there would be no way even a reasonable person could be expected to keep tabs on everything that drifted downstream every day. They decided to keep a second interview as a last resort.

After he dropped Maci at Miss Oberlin’s boarding house, Glenn stopped at the Dublin Road bridge over the river to talk to Dennis.

*****

MACI SHOWED UP at Glenn’s house that night with a bottle of wine. “Special occasion, right?” she asked. “Your friend is joining us? I picked it up at Hopewell’s, so I can’t vouch for their wine selection. And did I get some confused looks from the natives; they must think us Black folk drink nothing but malt liquor.”

“Uh.” Glenn hemmed and hawed a bit. “He gets hard to talk to if he starts drinking. Maybe ought to put that aside for now.” He opened the closest kitchen cupboard and stashed the wine bottle inside.

Maci started to complain about Glenn’s lack of gratitude but picked up on his anxiety. The dog had done the same, sitting on the kitchen floor with her ears back, only the tip of her tail wagging.

“More company than you’re used to?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he said without thinking. He squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head, not comfortable admitting that. “It’s just, most people don’t take to Dennis. And, you’re the FBI, I don’t want you to feel disrespected or anything.”

Maci was distracted by an old clock with a crumbling walnut back hung on the kitchen wall. “Glenn, you know your clock only has an hour hand?”

He frowned. “The Old Man knocked it off the wall having one of his fits. Years ago. I never bothered to replace it. My folks didn’t give much attention to the time when it did work.”

She turned back to Glenn’s unsettled mood. “You’re afraid your friend will offend the FBI agent, and you’re afraid the FBI agent will make your friend uncomfortable?”

He half-nodded and gestured to the back of the house. “We can go on out back. I got the grill started.”

“You don’t want to wait for Dennis to get here?”

“He’ll find us.” Glenn led the way to the back porch. A spaceship-shaped charcoal grill had a pile of briquettes still flaming. He’d pulled a third chair out from the kitchen and laid out an assortment of iced tea and salads from Hopewell’s deli.

“I was thinking,” Maci said, “we should check the land title records. I should have thought of that sooner. Ownership out there is fuzzy. It won’t take long to confirm who owns what, then we don’t have to second-guess ourselves.”

“We can head over to the courthouse tomorrow.” He nodded toward the field that bordered the back yard. “There’s Dennis now.”

Dennis crossed the field in a loping walk that almost looked simian. He carried two canvas bags over his shoulder and a guitar strapped to his back.

“Oh,” Maci said. “Does he live in the neighborhood?”

“No. He, uh, doesn’t really have a home.”

Maci rolled that thought around while Dennis walked up the back yard.

“What’s going on, buddy?” Dennis grinned and held his hands out in a give-me-five gesture. Glenn obliged by smacking his palms. Up close, the guitar looked to be a department store reject with splits in the wood patched with duct tape. Dennis immediately turned his attention to Maci. “You’re an FBI agent? Damn, Glenn, you should’ve joined the Feds, man!”

Maci shook his hand and smiled.

“Sorry,” Dennis said. “I don’t get in much.”

“You mean out?” she asked.

“I’m always out.” He waved his arms toward the backyard and the world beyond. “I don’t get indoors with you civilized folks.”

“What’d you bring with you?” Glenn gestured at the canvas bags.

Dennis set the bags on the plastic table. He unzipped one and said, to Maci, “You ain’t never had fish as good as this here.” He pulled a small foam cooler out of the bag and opened the lid. Half a dozen fish glistened inside. “Fresh caught this afternoon. I got some bluegill and even a couple of bass. It’s getting harder to find bass, what with all the pollution and shit going on upriver.”

“Good size bluegill,” Glenn said. “You did all right.”

“You caught these yourself?” Maci asked. “On the Salem, here in town?”

“Only time I smoke is before I go fishing,” Dennis said. “Indians used to offer up tobacco to their spirits so they’d catch more fish and not drown. Make fun all you want, but I eat better than most everyone in this town and it don’t cost me a penny.”

He unzipped the other bag. “Still early for a lot of crops, but I paid a little visit to Harpers’ farm.” He nudged Glenn. “One of my best suppliers, and they’re always the first to plant.”

Dennis removed an assortment of radishes, spinach, chard, and carrots from the bag.

“Check this out,” he reached inside the bag and pulled out a small basket of raspberries. “Got me some plants out in a undisclosed location.”

“You stole these?” Maci sorted through the produce and laughed.

“Stole? These berries grow wild. You know how much good food goes to waste out there? And when I do help myself from another person’s farm from time to time... Most people got more than they know what to do with. They won’t notice a little goes missing.”

“Everyone knows Dennis takes a little here and there,” Glenn said. “It’s not enough to notice, no one pays him any mind.”

None of them said anything about a town’s collective guilt over a man living under a bridge overpass.

Glenn washed off the vegetables under the water spigot on the back of the house. Dennis had his own knife (“Found this in someone’s trash, you believe that?”) and walked Maci through skinning and filleting the fish. They sat and ate the fresh raspberries while Glenn grilled the fish and vegetables. “’Bout the only cooking I know how to do,” Glenn said. “Easier than working a stove.”

“Don’t underestimate simplicity,” Maci said. “There’s a lot of beauty there. Judging from how good that fish smells.”

“I like her,” Dennis told Glenn. To Maci, “Most folks find out I’m homeless and don’t want nothing to do with me.”

“Food’s ready.” Glenn used a spatula to slide the food off the grill and onto paper plates. “Hey, Dennis, we were poking around the river north of town, you know that area where it’s state land and old man Crandall’s property?”

“Sure I do,” Dennis said. They took what they needed from a pile of silverware and sat down to tackle their food. “We did our share of trespassing there back in the day. You got respectable, but I’m still out there.” In Maci’s direction, he said, “I know the land in this county better than anybody you’ll meet.”

“You know we found the McCutcheons’ boat out in that area?” Maci asked.

“Could of come from anywhere upstream,” Dennis said. “I’m out there regular enough. There’s boats going down the river now and then. People fishing, potheads, guys bringing their girls out there.” He raised his hips from his chair to demonstrate. “Getting it on, you know? Even a hunter now and then; it’s rare, but I see them. Nobody hurts me, I don’t ask questions. I never seen a family out there. Plenty of state parks and such places for family types. I fish up and down the river. That stretch, ain’t much boat traffic.”

“Crandall used to have a reputation with all the local kids,” Glenn said. “He’d run them off that property, just like he did us twenty years ago. You’d have thought he had x-ray vision or something. Lately, though... We been out there a couple times this week, never saw a trace of him.”

“No, he’s older than the hills, man,” Dennis said. “He was old when we were kids. Don’t keep watch like he used to. He was just mean, you know? Kids would play in the river, just being kids, not doing any harm. He’d load up his shotgun with rock salt and let us have it. Word spread, everyone figured out what an asshole he was, people most times stayed away.”

“What did Crandall do?” Maci asked. “I mean, what kind of career did he have?”

Dennis laughed. “Pain in the ass, that’s what he did.”

“I don’t remember him having a job,” Glenn searched his memories. “Not in our time. Not that anyone ever talked of. Just grew some produce. Social security, maybe.” Glenn understood Maci’s point. How did he pay for all that land?

“You ever see a cave out there?” Glenn asked. “Mine tunnel, something like that?”

Dennis stroked his beard, nodded. “Yeah, I seen it. Next to that big old rock formation? Andersons told me about it, you remember them? Old folks, passed on a few years back.” He turned to Maci, “Miz Anderson baked me a pie now and then. Don’t get many folks that nice around here.” He nodded his head at the recollection. “They was talking about mining operations. Company came in and dug out a tunnel. Never amounted to nothing, I guess they couldn’t find whatever it was they was looking for. Way the Andersons told it, company sealed up the tunnel. Weather might have worn it down over the years, opened it up again. I’ve known about it but never told anyone. My whole home’s outdoors. I don’t need more reasons for people snooping around out there. Land gets spoiled enough as it is.”

“You ever explore it?” Maci asked. “Do you know how far back it goes?”

The sun was low and matched the dark look that came over Dennis’ face. “Can’t do it. I can only go in houses for short periods, and they got windows. Someplace that dark. No way.” He cleared his throat. “Claustrophobia. Bad.”

Maci gave Glenn a sideways look. He nodded.

“It’s one of the reasons I’m homeless,” Dennis said. His eyes burned bitter. “People just thought I was a retarded kid. Or full of the devil, you ask the church people. They’re the worst.”

“Dennis, I’m sorry,” Maci said. “Have you ever seen a therapist? You’d be surprised what they can help you with.”

“You kidding?” Dennis snorted. “Here? Nobody knows what to do with a screwed-up kid in this town. My folks sure as hell didn’t know what to do. My old man was more of a drunk than Glenn’s. School kids beat me up till I got big enough to hit back. That’s about when I checked out and hit the streets.”

“You’ve been homeless since you were a kid?” Maci asked.

“I was fourteen. I hobo’d on the trains for a long time.”

“There was a rail line ran about a mile outside of town. One more thing that passed us by. Dennis would go missing for days at a time. Weeks, sometimes. People thought he’d died or something till they figured out he was riding the freight trains.”

“The old-time hobos showed me how it worked. Figured out when I could jump on, when they’d leave doors on the rail cars open so I could breathe, where the different trains were going. It was hard, those early years. A lot of days, I went hungry. Ran from my share of kiddie rapists. People in Sommersville look at me now, they think I’m some lazy joker living rent free.” He shook his head. “They don’t know what I went through. They don’t know.

“Tracks got torn out in the seventies,” Dennis continued. “Old-timers said they were doing that all over the country. People going places by plane instead of trains. Forced me to settle down some. I took to fishing in the river. Swiping some produce here and there. Not enough so anyone minds much, even if they do figure out it’s me. I get by.”

Maci let out a long breath and looked at Dennis’ face, looking a lot older than her and Glenn even though they were the same age. Night had settled in and the fireflies were active.

“You remember when we were really little?” Dennis pointed out at the yard. “We’d catch fireflies and put them in jars?”

Glenn smiled. “You always let them go.”

Dennis looked into the night. “I figured out how they felt. Locked up like that. They was better free.”

Dennis picked at some potato salad on his plate. “We both had drunks for dads. Both of us freaks. You grow up in a town like Sommersville, and boys have got to like,” he ticked them off on his fingers, “guns, or cars, or sports. We weren’t no good at any of those. Glenn got smart about it, went into law enforcement. People here respect that.”

“Barely,” Glenn said. “Like I was saying the other night. Not a lot of choices growing up here.”

“Well, Dennis,” Maci said. “I don’t know if it matters, but I admire you for surviving the way you have.”

Maci pointed to the guitar leaning against the side of the house. “You play?”

“Self-taught,” Dennis cackled. He put the instrument over his shoulder and strummed away, not really playing a song but skilled enough that the notes sounded pleasant. When he opened his mouth to sing, the dog sat in front of him with a curious look.

––––––––

I don’t know where the river goes

I don’t know why the sky is blue

I don’t know what the future holds

I just know that I love you

––––––––

His voice was scratchy and out of tune but soft enough to let the lyrics sink in. He grew self-conscious at being the center of attention and grinned with a red face. “Just a little thing I made up. Never had me a sweetheart, but I imagine what it would be like sometimes.”

They wrapped up the night. Dennis turned it into a joke when he offered Maci a standing invitation to spend a night “under my humble overpass.” Glenn offered Dennis the leftover food from Hopewell’s, and his friend packed up his bags and walked into the night.

“I didn’t really have friends growing up,” Glenn said. “Just Dennis. My old man was bad, but...I tell you, his was a lot worse. Made a big difference, having a friend who knew what it was like.”

*****

THEY UPDATED Sheriff Howard early most mornings, while he was still coherent. “You being here is cheering him up,” Helen told Maci once. “You may not see it, but I do. He gets more and more sad every year. Sorry as he is about the circumstances, it does him good to see the two of you working so good together.” She put a hand on Glenn’s arm at that point. “You know how proud he is of you, even when he’s too shy to say it. He’s never once regretted making you his deputy.”

Glenn rolled his eyes, as if to say he’d heard it before and didn’t know how to take the compliment. Somewhere in his look was a fear that the loss of the McCutcheons was the first time he’d really had to put his law enforcement skills to work, and he remained uncertain about whether he was up to it. Maci had sent fingerprints recovered from the McCutcheon house to Chicago where they found no matches in a federal database. Having access to FBI resources impressed the townsfolk for a few days, but they lost interest when it didn’t turn up quick results.

“Mining companies have visited town many times over the years,” the sheriff told them when they reported on their conversation with Dennis. “It wouldn’t surprise me if there was more than one exploratory tunnel out there. But a cave? I’ve heard stories about a cave in that area but assumed the sources were unreliable. I can’t imagine we could ever find records that far back to tell us what companies were involved or what exactly they did.” To Maci, he said, “Towns like Sommersville are often...tempted by large corporations. Most often, it never amounts to anything substantial.”

“Big cities, too,” Maci grinned. “Trimmings are more generous there.”

“We’re going to check out the title records,” Glenn said. “The more we look at it, the less we’re sure about where exactly the line is between Mr. Crandall’s land and the state forest.”

The sheriff gave his blessing and, temperatures being cooler than previous days, Glenn and Maci walked the few blocks to the courthouse, a two-story brick structure with hardwood floors that hadn’t been sanded or stained in what looked like thirty years or more. In the land records office, they were helped by a middle-aged woman with graying auburn hair and glasses with thick tortoiseshell frames. She directed them to a room with rows of heavy wood shelves and a wood table against one wall.

“A lot of records were lost in the fifties,” she told them. “There was a roof leak ruined a whole mess of boxes.”

They recovered folders stuffed with legal-sized papers relating to Crandall’s property and several adjoining plots. They leafed through legal-size documents, many brittle and brown with age, filled with long paragraphs of jargon, notary seals, lawyer signatures, and surveys. They searched through the records for several minutes before admitting they couldn’t find the one thing they were looking for.

“I’m not seeing Crandall’s name in here,” Maci frowned. “We do have the right address?”

“This is it,” Glenn said. “Should be...right here.”

“And we agree he claims he bought that land in the 1930s? Well, it doesn’t matter, according to this he never bought it. Here’s a sale in 1938 to Daniel Fremont. Then a transfer in 1963 to the Estate of Daniel Fremont, LLC.”

Glenn rustled through the papers. “No other change of ownership as far back as the records go.”

“Crandall doesn’t own the land. He never did.”

“Look at this notary name on the 1938 sale.” Glenn held out a document to Maci and pointed his finger to the notary seal. “It’s Matthew Oberlin. That was a long time ago, but I only ever heard of one Oberlin family in town.”

6

Glenn went to the Empire State Bed & Breakfast first thing next morning to join Maci and Miss Oberlin for breakfast. Seated in the “dining hall,” as Miss Oberlin called it, he realized he had never seen the back of the building. The breakfast room looked out on a courtyard (Miss Oberlin called it the terrace) with a privacy screen of shrubs along the street. Several concrete benches and matching circular tables were set up among flowers and shrubs and two red maples.

“I don’t get the frequency of guests I once did,” Miss Oberlin said. “It gives me more time to tend to the terrace. Still, I think I prefer the presence of others.”

She served them breakfast on a long, wood table with cloth placemats for ten people. Once everything was prepared, she turned off a portable TV in the kitchen area, a small room dominated by tall wood cabinets and a broad cast-iron oven covered with dark blue porcelain enamel. One of the Indianapolis stations was airing a recap of the Iran-Contra hearings. “I’m slower in the kitchen than I used to be, so the people on TV keep me company,” she told them. “Sometimes company overstays its welcome.”

Mr. Nunn: Forget about Congress. Forget about the Intelligence Committee. How does the executive branch operate when so many people are misleading so many other people and particularly with you in a key position, and you were being misled over and over and over again according to your testimony.

Mr. Abrams: You can’t operate that way and I think that we, in the executive branch and you, in the Congress, know the way in which that was operating in the executive branch was a disaster, and the thing just fell apart.

Glenn tried to help serve the food but Miss Oberlin shushed him and pointed to a chair. She did allow Maci to help lay out the food, only because Maci had insisted as a guest; Maci explained under her breath that once Miss Oberlin learned the agent was single, she expressed admiration for the younger woman’s independence. Everything was served on vintage china that had been in the Oberlin family for generations: orange juice, coffee, bacon, pancakes, biscuits with apple butter, and a dish that Glenn at first feared was a vegetable pie. “This is a lovely breakfast quiche recipe my mother borrowed from friends in New York in the 1920s,” Miss Oberlin told them. Digging in to the food, it was clear that despite her age and frailty, Miss Oberlin’s cooking skills hadn’t suffered.

“Glenn, dear, it’s so nice of you to join us,” Miss Oberlin said. Glenn couldn’t remember the last time he had shared so many meals with anyone but the television. “How is your father doing?”

Glenn answered the same anytime someone asked about the Old Man. “Oh, he’s fine, being a character as always.”

Miss Oberlin repeated her comment about the Old Man helping her with repairs over the years, and elaborated with a story about a busted faucet that he replaced. “And all he asked for was a lemon meringue pie. That was my desert specialty, but I don’t bake them so often any more.”

Lillie Oberlin leaned back in her chair and looked with alarm around the fractional-acre of peace she had helped create.

“I do worry about what will happen to this place when I’m gone. I’ve been remiss in planning for that, but I’m in conversation with someone I hope will help. If we don’t preserve the beauty in our communities, they’re liable to be taken over by all that’s ugly.”

Glenn cleared his throat. “I know your family’s been in the area a long time.”

“Oh, my, yes, my grandparents came here from New York City,” she said. “That was my father’s parents, in the late 1800s, so he was already born. He met my mother here and they were married, then I came along...well, our country hadn’t even entered World War I when I was born. Can you imagine that? It seems so long ago.”

“And it was your parents that started the boarding house?” Maci bit into a forkful of pancakes.

“Yes, indeed.” Miss Oberlin picked at her food, hardly eating a thing. “My grandfather was one of the founders of the bank. Oh, there was another bank here before that, but it was not well managed, as I was told. My grandfather worked very closely with local businessmen to create a sense of community. Then, later, my father was one of the bank’s officers, but he also established the boarding house and my mother operated it. We had considerable traffic in those years, people passing through. Whether they were going east-west or north-south, you know, we’re called the Crossroads of America for good reason. We met so many interesting people. And as I grew up, my parents trained me to operate it. I kept a diary for years and wrote down all my thoughts of those days and the people who came through. The diaries just ended up in a box somewhere, with all the other relics.” She sighed. “I miss those busier times. Of course, there are things about the past I don’t miss.”

“And your grandfather was Matthew, wasn’t he, ma’am?” Glenn asked.

“Matthew, yes, from the Gospels.” The weight of years that lined her face made it impossible to be sure if that was a scowl on her face or sorrow at the loss of time.

“We were going through some old title records yesterday.” Glenn reached for another biscuit. “Came across his name as a notary, it got me thinking about the past.”

“Oh, yes, I guess he would have notarized, well, so many transactions over the years.”

“Does the name Fremont mean anything to you?” Maci asked. “Daniel Fremont? It might have been from a while back.”

“Fremont?” She replayed the years in her mind, tapping a fork against the tablecloth. “Now, I do recall Mr. Fremont. I believe he worked with grandfather in creating the bank. If my memory’s correct, Mr. Fremont was already established here when my grandparents arrived, but then he settled in Indianapolis. Sometime after the Depression, as I remember. Or round-about Indianapolis, at any rate.”

“Do you remember him holding much land around town?” Glenn asked. “Maybe north of town, out around where Mr. Crandall lives?”

“I think he had a house here in town. A very nice house, probably, but I don’t believe it’s still standing. As for that land north of here,” she scowled, “I’m not sure who owns it today, but I remember the family it was taken from.”

Maci looked at Glenn but kept the surprise off her face. Glenn had no need to hide the confusion common to his own expression.

“I don’t believe many are left who remember.” She set her fork down and traced a finger around the top of her coffee mug. “I’ve forgotten most of it myself. It was so long ago. That poor family. A Miami family.”

“The Miami Indians?” Maci asked.

“Yes. Some of them still survive, but they were quite prosperous in these parts in the 1700s,” Miss Oberlin said. “Many of them were run off to the west, but in my time...I mean by the nineteen-tens and -twenties...this was one of the last families left. I don’t mean family in the small way we use it. This was a large, extended family, a clan or community, I’m not sure what word they used. Three or four generations and their spouses. They had a collection of houses and small farm-buildings and they lived on, oh, acres and acres of land, it must have gone on for miles. And they lived off the land. They farmed and hunted and relied on the river. People called them savages, but...we didn’t know how civilized they were.”

“And they owned that land?” Maci asked. “Out where Mr. Crandall lives today?”

“I don’t think they owned it in the conventional sense. But it was theirs, surely as if God gave it to them Himself. They had been there for generations. They never hurt anyone. But, you know, that much land, people will always have their eye on it. And since it was platted and titled the way our people thought it should be, that didn’t leave the Miami with many rights. There was a whole group of local men. My grandfather, and your grandfather, too, Glenn. Mr. Fremont. They made it so that family had no choice, really, but to give up the land. Oh, they tried to get lawyers to defend their rights, but this world never had much sympathy for those people. That’s when our people took over the land.”

Glenn fixed his eyes out the window, where a blue jay hopped from a branch to the ground, pecked at whatever it was looking for, and took back to the safety of the trees. He’d already heard more town history in recent weeks than he cared to. Whatever had happened to the McCutcheons, the world seemed to want to torture the rest of them until the time came they could make it official the family wasn’t coming back.

“What happened to them?” Maci asked. “The Miami, I mean.”

Miss Oberlin pursed her lips. “It was so long ago.” She studied the place mat. “I suppose they moved on to other parts.”

“Do you have any children of your own?” Maci asked. “Any family in the area?”

“Oh, my, no.” Her voice came out as a whisper. “I was not able to have children.” Her eyes lost focus on the present and recalled memories of long ago. “The good old days were quite awful sometimes.”

None of them had much appetite left. Glenn and Maci didn’t want to upset this fragile woman further. Glenn looked outside again, but the bird had flown off.

*****

AT GLENN’S HOUSE that night, a growing wind warned of a storm front on the prowl. Tree branches shook and the sky flashed white with lightning. Glenn left the TV on with the sound muted to watch weather reports on one of the Indianapolis stations. They sat inside with the sliding door open; the awning over the door stretched far enough out to keep rain from blowing in. Cara stood watch at the screen door and rose to attention with every rumble of thunder.

Maci picked up on Glenn’s anxiety over the weather and tried to distract him with unpleasantness of a more material nature.

“I know they’re not solid,” she said, “but at least we have possible leads. The mine tunnel. Figuring out why Daniel Fremont’s estate owns the land Mr. Crandall lives on.”

“Maybe we’ll look into the land question first,” Glenn said. “I’m not wild about going into that cave, even with proper lights.”

“I hear you.” Neither of them wanted to think about how far that tunnel might go, or what they might find there. The fact remained, unless something else turned up, they would have to go in there to call the investigation complete.

“I been wanting to ask you something,” Glenn said, never taking his eyes off the bluster outside.

“Shoot.”

He fidgeted. “I don’t... I don’t mean any disrespect. I understand the FBI operates different than us locals. But,” he gave his head a confused shake, “you’re not working the way I’d ever expect an FBI agent to work. I mean, you got to have procedures for this kind of thing. Time frames. They give you deadlines and things, don’t they? This don’t even seem big enough for the FBI to bat their eyes at.”

The house creaked and groaned when a strong wind gust rolled over. A red band across the bottom of the TV screen scrolled a list of areas under a tornado warning, including Sommersville.

Maci gave a slow nod. Stretched her shoulders and took in a deep breath. “You’re right. I’m not really here for the investigation. I mean, giving you any support you need, that’s no lie. But that’s not really why they sent me here. Truth is, I’m in the doghouse. There was an incident in Chicago. A drug bust went bad, an agent was injured. Things are hot for me right now. My Special Agent in Charge decided it was best for me to get out of Dodge till the situation cools off. Your case came on the radar at the right time. Can’t blame you if you’re-”

Offended by that is what she meant to say. A crack of thunder rattled the house and set them both on the edge of their seats. The lights flickered. Cara circled and whimpered. Glenn felt disoriented, a falling sensation, when he stood to close the sliding door.

“Are the other windows closed?” Maci shouted over the sudden downpour of rain blown sideways by the wind and rattling against the glass. Glenn shook his head. Another flash of lightning and the electricity shut off completely.

They worked their way through the house, closing the few open windows. Cara stayed close to Glenn’s heels. Flashes of lightning cast ugly shadows around the rooms. The torrent of wind was like a freight train on top of thunder crashes. Rain beat against the house like gunfire. They could almost believe God was real and as angry as the Old Testament made Him out to be. Glenn remembered similar storms during his childhood in this same house. One vivid night from his early grade school years, a storm woke him during the night and he left his bedroom in search of security, still too young to understand that security wasn’t anything his parents would offer. He’d experienced the same disorientation then, uncertain where he was or what direction to head. The house had become elastic, changing as he moved, a maze with no solution. He’d nearly bumped into his mother, up to go to the restroom and sounding half-asleep when she’d said, “It’s just some rain. Go back to bed.” Nothing phased her. A lifetime of uncertainty and intermittent abuse had worn her fear down to ground level. Glenn got better at hiding his fear over the years, but it mostly stayed right near the surface, as it was now. He was in the hallway alone, as far as he could tell in the dark, when thunder cracked through the house so loud, he reeled against the wall and ducked for cover.

The worst of the weather faded off in the sky. The wind calmed and the time between the thunder and lighting got longer. Glenn went in the garage, storage for whatever junk the Old Man had left behind since Glenn always parked the car in the driveway. There was a stepladder, boxes of nails, screws, hinges, and other metal parts, some rusted out power tools the Old Man had once planned to patch up. Glenn reset the electric panel and the house lights came on.

The rain eased up to a light drizzle. They stepped outside to let the dog run around the back yard. The humidity felt like a steam bath.

Maci hadn’t minded the storm’s invitation to change the subject. “Your father and grandfather both got a mention this morning,” she said. “You were awful quiet about it.”

“My dad’s parents died while I was young. My mom’s parents left before I was born. Some kind of falling out with my mom. Never heard from them.”

“My grandparents raised me, mostly,” Maci said. “My mom went to Detroit for a temporary nursing job that became permanent. Dad had a job working night shifts in a factory, and during the day he slept or did his own thing. It was my grandpa gave me the idea to go into law enforcement. He said a Black person only had a few choices to avoid being treated second-class. I didn’t have the talent for music. Tried softball. I had a kick-ass batting average for high school, but barely average for college. But law enforcement? I loved putting together puzzles, solving cases. I managed to get into the FBI academy. Grandpa was wrong about the discrimination part, it still happens, but,” she grinned, “you know most people taken into FBI custody are white? Grandpa would have got a kick out of that. Things could have gone a lot worse for me.”

Glenn tried to imagine being raised by his grandparents. He wasn’t sure it would have been better, but couldn’t see what would have made it worse. He thought back to the last time a storm so bad had come through and he’d been alone in the house. Took him hours to unstitch himself from that. Watching the dog trot around the yard and listening to Maci’s voice, he’d almost forgotten what had frightened him.

“I was in high school, the Old Man signed me up to work the fields detasseling corn in the summers.”

“Detasseling corn?”

“You never heard of it?”

“I’m a city girl,” she said. “Our fields were parking lots.”

“The tassels on tops of corn stalks? I guess for seed corn, they got to remove those. So some of the bigger farms around here, they hire groups of kids to go through the fields and pull out the tassels. They’d take us out on buses at the crack of dawn. That was the hottest I’ve ever been, working those fields. We’d start before sunrise, so mosquitoes ate us alive right off the bat. You had to wear long sleeves, or the corn stalks would cut your arms up. We’d still get it in our faces some. ‘Bout near collapsed by the time we finished.”

Glenn stared out across the dark yard. The clouds were already thinning out and letting some moonlight through.

“There was a state trooper would park out there some days. Said the landowners wanted him out there watching us, for liability. That was a crock. You know that guy sat in his cruiser all day, running his air conditioning, looking at magazines and taking naps? Looked like the easiest job in the world. I figured I’d rather be the guy keeping watch than the guy working in the field. It was my own laziness brought me to law enforcement.”

He thought about that stableboy haunting his mind and his own childhood when he’d been knocked to the very ground they were standing on for not mowing the grass in straight enough lines. He thought about how it was the thunder that frightened him but the lightning did the real damage.

“You were talking about meditation the other night,” Glenn said. “Got me curious. You think you could tell me more about that?”

“I can get you started. You want to pick up some books on the subject. And find someone serious to train you. There must be some retreats or workshops in Indianapolis. Definitely in Chicago, if not.” She turned to face him. “Buddhism says we live in a cycle of rebirth. Every time we’re reborn, it’s a chance to recover from past mistakes and obtain wisdom. Until we attain nirvana, we’ll carry the sins of the past with us and keep being reborn and living these flawed lives.”

“Nirvana?”

“Nirvana is part of the Four Noble Truths. It’s kind of an experience of perfection. If you free yourself of the three poisons – passion, aversion, and ignorance – you can achieve nirvana. There’s a lot more to it than that. I’m just a beginner, but you get the idea.”

“Aversion?”

“Hatred. The opposite of passion, or lust.”

“Fear.” It wasn’t a question.

“Yeah, good point, fear and hatred go together. There’s a lot of depth to this stuff, I’m giving you the sixty-second version. But meditation is part of the path to nirvana. The goal isn’t to empty your mind. It’s to free yourself of attachments, so you can look at the world objectively and cleanse yourself of the three poisons.”

He understood maybe a fraction of what she told him. “I might like to give this meditation a try. Might be too difficult for me, I don’t know.”

She shook her head. “You can do it. Trust me. Anyone can. Look, close your eyes.” She lowered her voice to nearly a whisper. “Breathe normal. Relax your shoulders. Normally you’d be sitting, but this is fine. Just breathe. Any thoughts come into your mind, try to just...look at them, without attaching any emotions. When that happens, just come back to focus on your breath.”

He could have floated away on her voice.

“Don’t try to control your breath,” she said. “Just pay attention to it. Whatever comes up, just look at it, and let it go.”

Easy for her to say. Thoughts flicked through his mind like the fireflies in the yard. Disorientation during a storm that pulled his childhood up against the present day like a rubber band. The corn stalks slashing at his face. The day Angie told him she was seeing someone else. The day, years later, when she told him the same damn thing. The Old Man whacking him over the head. His mother, no stranger to the Old Man’s blows herself, but laughing when it was Glenn’s turn. The boy crushed by beasts almost big enough to hold all his fears.

He opened his eyes. “You all right?” Maci asked.

He scrunched his eyes shut and opened them again. “Maybe I’m not cut out for that.”

“Most of us aren’t used to being alone with our thoughts,” she said. “Takes some getting used to. Gets smoother with practice. Try it ten or fifteen minutes a day. Find a quiet spot, sit, and breathe.”

“Guess I got more on my mind than I realized.”

“I’ve worked with my share of lazy people, Glenn,” Maci said. “And you know I’ve seen some lazy crooks. You’re not lazy. That’s not what’s keeping you here.”

*****

MACI WENT BACK to the boarding house but Glenn couldn’t sleep. Too many thoughts he didn’t know what to make of. He looked at the TV a few minutes but still couldn’t quiet his mind. He left Cara in the house and drove to the trailer park north of town. The red scarf was out and Brenda did what she always did, turn off his anxiety enough that he could relax, at least for a while.

After, they sat outside like always, Brenda smoking while her son slept a short distance away. The TV was tuned to the hearings and they could barely hear the voices of those distant happenings.

Mr. Liman: Did you find it surprising that General Secord, a private citizen, and a lieutenant colonel, and a retiree or an annuitant, as they call them, of the CIA, could, without any congressional approval, or anything more that you knew of, make these kinds of representations to the leader of the Iranian delegation?

Mr. Hakim: My impression, Mr. Liman, was from the very beginning that the President of the United States was supporting this mission. It was cleared with him. And in my mind I can’t go further than the President’s authorities, and I didn’t judge the policy of the President.

“You know that state forest out off the turnpike?” he asked her. “Old man Crandall lives out that way. All that protected land?”

“Yeah,” she said. “I thought for years they were going to turn that into a state park. Wasn’t that the talk? Sure would have made more sense than closing it off.”

“You ever hear about Indians living there? Before the state came in?”

“I think I remember something about that.” She tilted her head up and breathed out a cloud of smoke. “Seems like a lumber company was after that land before the state bought it up. Or maybe it was for a factory. Some company or other, I’m sure, wanted it for something.”

“Yeah, now I think about it, you’re right,” he said. “Why’s the state keeping all that land fenced off, no one using it? I never even thought about it that way.”

“Maybe they’re holding out for a richer company,” she chuckled. “A higher bid. This have something to do with the McCutcheons and your FBI friend?”

He didn’t know what it could possibly have to do with the McCutcheons. They were chasing after ghosts because they had nothing better to do. “Not really. I was just thinking about the past. Wondering why things are the way they are.”

She grunted and tossed the cigarette butt on the concrete. “Hell, Glenn, this town’s nothing but past. All this shit gets handed down from one generation to the next. Nothing ever changes. You know what I think about that.”

He frowned and stared at the ground. That was a big piece of land to put out of use. The state park idea had come up now and then over the years. A developer or other business must have had their eyes on it. If they weren’t going to develop the state park, why not sell it?

*****

EVEN WHEN he got home from Brenda’s in the early hours he couldn’t sleep. He turned on the TV and slumped onto the couch. Cara curled up next to his feet to sleep. The independent station broadcast an old movie called X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes. He couldn’t tell if it was supposed to be funny or a tragedy. A scientist conjured up some magic eyedrops that gave him x-ray vision. The scientist hung out with some young people and looked through women’s dresses. In the end he wandered the desert and blinded himself from seeing more than one person could stand. Glenn understood the sentiment.

He couldn’t remember falling asleep but woke up at first light when the phone rang. The dog lay on one end of the couch with her eyes half open. Glenn tottered into the kitchen to pick up the phone.

“Glenn, it’s Maci. Miss Oberlin broke her hip. The boarding house is closing.”

*****

GLENN HADN’T wiped all the sleep from his eyes by the time he pulled up to the boarding house. An ambulance was parked with the back end open and facing the front door. Two paramedics had already loaded Miss Oberlin on board. “Sounds like she fell on the stairs,” one of them said. “Probably a fractured hip.” He pointed to Maci, standing on the sidewalk in shorts and a t-shirt, holding two cups of coffee. “Good thing the agent was here, no one would have known what happened.”

“Where you taking her?” Glenn asked.

“Sunrise Manor for now,” the paramedic said while his partner closed up the back of the ambulance. Glenn got a glimpse of Miss Oberlin, unconscious, he hoped just sleeping, inside. “They’ll take x-rays, get a handle on her condition, sort out her insurance. Probably someplace better after that.”

No decent person ended up at Sunrise Manor by choice.

He went to Maci. She handed him one of the coffees. “Hopewell’s diner was open so I picked these up. I can’t tell if the locals are more nervous when you’re with me or when I’m alone.”

“Sorry. I don’t think they mean it, they just... I’m not saying it’s right... We just don’t get a lot of...”

“I know what it is,” she scowled. She shook it off and nodded toward the ambulance as it pulled away. “Hip fracture at her age is serious, but I’ve seen worse. She was conscious and talking when I found her. She said she doesn’t have any relatives in the area?”

“No relatives anyplace, far as I know,” he said. “I’ll talk to the sheriff, he’s probably got a better idea than anyone what she wants done.”

“Some kind of miracle she’s not worse off,” Maci said. “I’ll get my stuff.”

“You can use the spare room at my house,” Glenn said. “It’s not the cleanest, but it’s comfortable enough, I guess.”

“I don’t need much.” She punched him on the shoulder. “I guess breakfasts at Che Haskell aren’t as good as Miss Oberlin’s.”

He watched the ambulance drive away.

“The history doesn’t change, Glenn,” she said on her way in the boarding house door. “It’s the faces that change.”

*****

GLENN LEFT MACI to gather her things and talked with the sheriff about Miss Oberlin.

The sheriff admitted his hopelessness by saying, “I prayed she would outlive us all. That poor woman has seen the worst of us but still reflects our best qualities.”

The sheriff promised to follow up on Miss Oberlin’s status and start making arrangements to secure the boarding house. It was early enough in the day, Glenn believed the sheriff could do it, or at least set Helen to work on it.

At the end of the day, Glenn and Maci picked up dinner at Hopewell’s deli as usual, after taking a side trip through the hardware section to pick up flashlights and two sets of batteries. The sheriff’s office was prepared to search in the dark of night but not in a cave or tunnel. They bought the most powerful flashlights in stock, and Glenn pleased himself by thinking of chalk to mark the tunnel walls in case the cave was too deep to return by memory. Between the deli and the hardware aisles, three different people – strangers to Maci but of some acquaintance to Glenn – asked him why the search for the McCutcheons’ was taking so long. “We’re pursuing every lead,” Glenn grumbled to each of them.

They set up on the outside table at Glenn’s house but felt more awkward than previously, what with Maci being a guest now. They danced around the thought of exploring the mine tunnel.

“The natives are getting restless,” Maci said, referring to the questioners at Hopewell’s.

“Not much to do here but talk about what other people are doing,” Glenn said. “And that’s usually not much, either.”

“Guess we’ll need to get an early start tomorrow.” Maci stood and began collecting the food containers and paper plates. “If you’ll direct me to my suite?”

“Yeah.” Glenn stood. “There’s pillows and sheets on the bed but no one sleeps in there so they don’t get changed much. Clean blankets in the hall closet.”

Maci followed him down the short hallway that connected the two bedrooms and bathroom to the rest of the house. He opened a closet door and used one hand to pull out a set of blankets and the other hand to restrain the debris pile that threatened to escape. Glenn handed the blankets to Maci and tipped over a shoe box in the process. Snapshots spilled out, most of them showing their age with dulled colors and white edges turning brown.

“Family history?” Maci kneeled on the floor and traced her fingers across the images.

Glenn looked confused. “Forgot these were in here.” He’d never found much worth remembering in his family’s history. He looked at the photos arranged so bits and pieces of different snapshots overlaid each other. Fractions of moments in lives that hadn’t amounted to much, including his own. He resisted his first impulse, to toss them in the trash. Maci seemed in a mood to ask questions and he didn’t want to get into that. Instead, he scooped them up by the handful and shoved them back in the box. A few escaped across the floor as he picked them up.

A black and white image, not completely focused and overly contrasted, caught his eye. Five men stood on a street near the curb, in front of a brick building. Two of them, older men with full heads of gray hair, wore dark suits with ties and vests. The others were younger and wore denim pants and work shirts with the sleeves rolled up. All five smiled for the camera, but the smiles looked more comfortable on the men in suits.

“That’s the old bank.” Glenn pointed to the building in the background.

“The bank? The one Lillie Oberlin’s family started?”

Glenn nodded. He tapped a finger at one of the working class men. “Pretty sure that one’s my grandpa. My old man’s father.”

“Did he work at the bank?”

Glenn sneered at the thought. “Book smarts don’t much run in my family. No, in the thirties I think he mostly did work for the WPA. Maybe the Civilian Conservation Corps, too. They did a lot of projects all through Indiana in the Depression. Parks, bridges.”

He flipped over the photo; someone had written 1937 on the back with a grease pencil. Reviewing the faces, he pointed to one next to his grandfather. “I’d almost swear that’s old man Crandall.”

Maci leaned in close and squinted at the image. “I see a resemblance. Do you think one of them is Miss Oberlin’s father? Or grandfather?”

Glenn tilted his head. “Guess we can’t ask her now.” He sighed. “There’s someone we could ask. Might even answer us, we catch him in a good mood.”

While he puzzled over the photo, trying to recall the family secrets he would never have known in the first place, Maci the inquisitive Federal agent scanned the jumbled-up contents of the closet.

“Is that a musical instrument?” She pointed to a black case in the back of the closet. She would zoom in on the last thing he wanted to talk about. He didn’t think to distract her with the story about the time when he was thirteen and borrowed the Old Man’s crescent wrench to repair his bike, and when he lost the wrench he spent the whole night crammed in that very same closet, figuring it seemed like a reasonable place to avoid a beating.

The Old Man just waited till next morning and shoved him against the wall.

Maci had pulled out the oblong case. “This is a flute. Is this yours, Glenn?”

There didn’t seem to be anyone else around to blame. “It’s just, yeah, it’s mine, from a long time ago, don’t pay it no mind.”

“I had no idea you’re a musician,” she said, and that got a good laugh from Glenn.

“Not even close,” he said. “Just something I played around with a long time ago... Flute’s not really something a boy can get away around here. I gave it up real quick.”

“I think it’s great, but how’d you even get a flute around here?”

“It was a loaner from the school. The music teacher had to scrape the bottom of the barrel to find enough students to keep his classes going. So he gathered everyone up and had us try out different instruments. Seventh, eighth grade, I reckon? I liked the sound of the flute. Can’t really say why.”

“That was me with the saxophone. I love it when it’s played right, but I couldn’t get more than a screech out of it to save my life.”

“Didn’t realize I was putting my foot in it. I only had to bring a flute home once. Every kid I walked past like to hit me just for carrying it. Got home and the Old Man had a fit about what a sissy his boy was. Woke up the next morning and it was gone. Old Man said he threw it out, he was so ashamed. Teacher wasn’t stupid, all of them knew I got beat up now and then, all he could do was let it go. Only I found it in a closet later...probably this same closet...the Old Man was planning to sell it. Reckon he forgot and it stayed in the closet.” Glenn shook his head. “Damn fool was always running scams like that, in between doing road work or odd jobs for people like Miz Oberlin. By then, I was too embarrassed to take it back to school.”

“It meant enough to you that you kept it.” She opened the snaps on the case and lifted the top. The instrument was dingy with age. “Just because some kids called you names a long time ago...”

“It wasn’t just kids.”

She scowled. “Sorry. But they’re not here now, right? In your own home? There must be an instructor somewhere who could give you lessons, or books, something. Here,” she handed him the open case and the flute dusty from neglect, “show me. Play something.”

“I don’t know how to play anything,” he grumbled. “Never played the thing enough to learn much in the first place.”

“Come on.” She grabbed his sleeve and pulled him to the living room and the couch. “Anything. Just play some notes, I want to hear what it sounds like.”

He didn’t want to admit how much her opinion had come to mean to him in such a short time. He screwed together the sections of the flute and wiped off the mouth piece with his shirt sleeve.

He slowly worked his fingers over the keys and tilted his eyes up to look at Maci sideways. “You sure about this?”

“Hey, I love music,” she said. “Just making the effort impresses me.”

He held the flute in position and rested his lower lip on the lip plate. He blew over the embouchure hole a few times. Cara sat in front of them and tilted her head at the strange sounds from this object that looked suspiciously like a chew toy.

“All right,” he muttered. Pursed his lips and inhaled. The notes had a lot of breath in them. The key pads were dried out and didn’t close up all the way. He was off key and got a lot of the notes wrong. The tempo was uneven and slower than a Sunday driver. But Maci picked up quick enough on what he was playing and hummed along. She sang a couple lines in a soft voice, Gonna lay down my sword and shield, down by the riverside, down by the riverside...

When he stopped she slapped her knees. “I love that song! You keep surprising me, Glenn.”

“I’m not religious at all.” He took the flute apart before he got badgered into any more. “Always liked the song, though.”

Maci urged him to take up the flute seriously and Glenn tried to direct the conversation away from himself. That old photo continued to distract him.

“We can ask around about that tomorrow,” he said. “Maybe put off going to the cave until the next day.”

Maci headed off to bed with a plan to meditate first. Glenn sat on the couch, trying to get absorbed in a movie, Cara laying on the floor next to him. They showed Creature from the Black Lagoon but he’d seen it before and the arguing between the two men, the science guy who tried to play it safe and the money guy that only wanted a prize, felt too much like real life. Of course the money guy was wrong. The fantasy part came when the money guy risked his own hide in the end, something Glenn never saw money guys do in real life.

Too conscious of Maci asleep in the back room and Cara asleep at his feet, the flute churning up a whole new round of memories, Glenn stood with a huff and turned off the set. He decided to give Maci’s meditation advice a whirl. He sat up straight, closed his eyes, and took a few deep breaths to settle himself. He did what she’d said, focus on his breathing, and found his thoughts spread out like a swarm of gnats. With every breath he pulled his mind back from the kids at school laughing at him when he picked up the flute in music class that time, Dennis sleeping alone every night along the river bank, his mom sneering that she always took him for gay when he’d first started dating Angie, that dark cave entrance that kept its true depth hid, the pastor and his Old Man and the old man in the White House and all the other authority figures who betrayed the trust of people who never had a choice. After a while, without trying, his thoughts turned in a friendlier direction: the sheriff gave him a kind word, he and Dennis caught a mess of bass on a sunny afternoon, the dog jumped around the yard like she was in paradise, Maci put her hand on his forehead again.

Next thing he knew, he opened his eyes and first morning light was coming through the windows, and the dog stared at him, waiting to be fed.

*****

MACI WAS ALREADY AWAKE and figuring out where the coffee was. All he had was instant but she said it was better than nothing. He apologized four or five times for not having more food on hand. She confessed to getting spoiled at the boarding house but the FBI accountants would be happy about her expense reports and maybe that was more important for the time being. He fried up some eggs while Maci toasted the plain white bread that had nearly been in the cupboard too long. They put some mayo on the bread and had fried egg sandwiches.

“One of the few good things my old man did for me,” Glenn said. “Showed me how to make these.”

“Not bad,” Maci said. “Could use some cheese.”

“Hope it was comfortable enough,” Glenn said once he got over his own discomfort about asking.

“Slept like a baby,” she said. “I know I keep saying it, but I can’t believe how quiet it is around here. Was that an owl I heard earlier?”

“Could be.” He nodded. “They hunt mice in the field out back.”

Glenn left the sliding door open so Cara would have the run of the fenced-in yard. He and Maci took his cruiser into town. Glenn tried to prepare himself for a fresh round of embarrassment.

*****

THEY PULLED INTO the lot at Sunrise Manor and Glenn gave Maci some background in preparation of meeting the Old Man. Before his mom died, his father had an accident; or, as far as anyone knew, it was an accident. He fell off the roof trying to adjust the TV antenna, about the only thing that would have ever motivated him to get on the roof in the first place. He landed on his back, and his body never worked the same after. Glenn’s mom was never much for caring about others and was starting to show her own illness by then, though it took years to understand how truly sick she was. The Old Man wanted to keep living in the house with Glenn taking care of him, but Glenn had reached an age where he wasn’t so easy to beat up, and soon enough he was off to the academy and out of reach. The Old Man kept on in the house till even he had to admit falling off the toilet and getting covered in his own shit was worse than whatever compromises he’d have to make living in a rest home. Sunrise Manor delivered enough medication and nursing help for him to function.

Inside, at the end of the main hall, they ran into Walt and Frieda leaving the cafeteria, Walt towing his oxygen tank on a small cart. The couple homed in on Maci and asked her questions about the “big city.” Walt was clearly smitten and did his clumsy best to flirt with her. Glenn followed the direction of Walt’s nod into the cafeteria to find the Old Man sitting with Mitchell at a round table, pushing soggy pancakes and watery scrambled eggs around a plate with his fork. The big room was lightly occupied; most of the old-timers hurried in to eat breakfast first thing, then spent the rest of the morning wondering why lunch took so long to serve. Mitchell nodded at Glenn and ate his breakfast in silence and with considerable more dignity.

“Better’n your mom used to make, and that ain’t saying much,” the Old Man said. “Hear you’re running around with a nig-”

“Careful.” Glenn sat down.

“Hear you’re running around with a Negro woman.”

“We’re not running around. She’s an FBI agent. Here helping with a case.”

The Old Man sputtered laughter and bits of egg landed on his chin. “Still ain’t found them yet, have you?”

Glenn didn’t bother debating. He took the photograph from his pocket and put it on the table.

“Found this going through some stuff,” he said. “You ever seen this? Isn’t that grandpa?”

The Old Man leaned his head down and squinted. “Yeah, that’s him. Must be back in the forties or something.”

“Says 1937 on the back. You know any of these other guys? I was wondering if one of them might be related to Miz Oberlin. Maybe her father? Grandfather? That’s the bank behind them.”

Mitchell finished a last piece of bacon and backed away from the table as quietly as he could. “I’ll give you some privacy. Good seeing you, Glenn.”

The Old Man touched a greasy thumb to one of the faces. “Could be him. He got his picture taken a lot. What do you want to know that for?”

“You recognize any of the others? I was thinking this one looks like old Mr. Crandall. Can you tell?”

“How the hell do I know who it is?” The Old Man dropped his fork and gave his chin an angry wipe with a napkin. “I don’t got time to be messing around with no old pictures. I was just a kid in thirty-seven.”

Glenn pocketed the photo and changed direction. “You know anything about any caves or tunnels outside of town? The sheriff thought some mining company might have done some exploring.”

The Old Man pushed his chair back. “There’s caves all over Indiana. You know that. What are you asking all these dumb questions for? No wonder you can’t find those people.”

He was about to stand and leave but Maci came in with Frieda and Walt. He stood anyway and Glenn could have sworn a light had turned on at how quick the Old Man’s temperament changed.

“You must be that pretty FBI agent I been hearing good things about.” The Old Man reached out a hand – fingers beginning to lock up in the early stages of arthritis – to shake hands with Maci. She indulged them all with a patient smile. She and the Old Man exchanged names and he pointed her to a chair. Frieda sat in the remaining seat. Glenn stood so Walt could sit, but Walt tried to be gallant, so that left both men standing with a chair vacant.

“Ain’t no big city,” the Old Man waved around the room, “we get by for a small town. Whole town’s relieved you’re here, we’re all hoping you find them people safe and all.”

“You must be very proud of Glenn,” Maci said. “I really enjoy working with him.”

Frieda and Walt disappeared behind their eyeglasses while the Old Man pretended he hadn’t heard. “Hey, you like card tricks? We was about to head down to the game room.” He took a deck of cards from his shirt pocket. “People losing cards all the time here, I always keep a full deck on hand. Here, let’s make room now...”

Frieda helped him move the tray and glasses to the side. Samuel spread the cards out on the table face down. “Any of you got a pen?” he asked.

Maci glanced sideways to be sure Glenn had a pen in his uniform pocket before she removed a pen from her own pocket and said, “What kind of law enforcement agent would I be if I didn’t have something to write with?” Sure enough, the Old Man looked up to see if Glenn had a pen, too.

“Okay, now, here’s how it works,” the Old Man said. “You pick any card. Then you write your phone number on the face of the card. Careful, now, don’t let me see it.”

Walt chuckled and shook his head. Maci raised an eyebrow and hovered a hand over the deck before picking her card. She shielded it with her left hand and wrote on the front. The Old Man pushed the cards together and set the deck in front of her. “Now you put your card on top of the deck. Don’t show it to me.”

Maci slyly set her card on top of the deck and gave it a tap with her index finger.

“You ready?” the Old Man said. Maci nodded. He grabbed up the deck and put it in his pocket.

“Hey!” Maci laughed. “That’s no card trick!”

“Trick is to get a pretty girl’s phone number.” The Old Man stood with a smile. “Don’t get your heart set on a fancy date or nothing, though, cause I ain’t got much in the way of transportation here.”

“Very funny, Samuel.” Frieda gently pushed his shoulder. They stood to leave; Glenn had listened to the Old Man about all he could for one day. As they left, the Old Man spoke not a word to Glenn but told Maci how much he enjoyed meeting her. They bumped into Mitchell on their way out.

“I thought about someone you might want to talk to,” Mitchell said. He blinked his eyes rapidly. “He’s a real nice fellow name of Jeffrey Slocum. Trying to start up a county historical museum. He’s got a little set-up at the county library branch, works as a librarian and does the historical things in his off hours. He’s new around here, lives out to Concord, but he gave a talk here last week about railroads and whatnot, real knowledgeable. They’re talking about inviting him back.”

“I appreciate the tip, Mitchell. What kind of information do you think this Slocum might have?”

“The picture you showed your dad,” Mitchell blinked. “If you’re trying to identify historical figures, or things that happened in the past. He might have some knowledge of it, or know someone who does.” That made it sound as if Mitchell had relevant knowledge but didn’t want to talk about it, like everyone else in town, and he was too nice a guy for Glenn to feel comfortable putting pressure on.

Glenn and Maci pushed open the doors to walk outside and Glenn apologized for his father’s behavior.

“The joke’s on him.” Maci grinned and put on her sunglasses. “That wasn’t my phone number.”

7

They hiked back to the cave entrance, better prepared this time with a couple of roast beef sandwiches from Hopewell’s, along with the canteens, and the flashlights and batteries they’d purchased earlier. They had marked the general location on the map, but finding the gully and the exact spot took time. The sun had nearly reached midday by the time they found it, so they sat on a broad log and ate the sandwiches before going in. Maci had the good sense to scrounge up a couple of walking sticks. “I don’t want to walk into any cobwebs,” she said.

They had to bend over the trunks of a few skinny maple trees growing in front of the tunnel. Glenn was grateful for a “ladies first” excuse to let Maci precede him through the tight entrance. The flashlight beams created small shafts of light that pulled them forward. The tunnel was cramped and soggy. Wood beams that looked none too sturdy propped up the sides and ceiling. A few old paper wrappers and aluminum cans littered the path. Maci tapped one of the cans with her walking stick. “Almost completely rusted. They’ve been here a long time.”

They waved the sticks in the air from time to time but didn’t encounter many cobwebs. A few lizards and snakes that hurried out of their way explained that. The air grew surprisingly cool after a short distance. For the first time, Glenn began to understand Dennis’ claustrophobia. The tunnel was snug enough, but the darkness surrounded them more intensely than any walls ever could. He had a sense of the tunnel closing in on them even though the width remained steady. Cold sweat dripped down their foreheads. The path angled downward; each step took them deeper into the earth.

Advancing slowly, they detected the sound of water dripping on stone, in spite of being surrounded entirely by dense soil.

The man-made tunnel came to a sudden end. They stepped into a broad space just tall enough to stand upright. The lights revealed a room of stone about thirty feet across in a rough circle. Most of the rock was dry and smooth but water seeped in through cracks across the top. Glenn touched the low rock ceiling.

“Limestone,” he said. “This looks like a real cave.”

“Right,” Maci said. The stone and dense air gave their voices a muffled echo. “I think it is.” She used her light as a pointer. “Check that out.”

Areas of the ceiling were smudged black like coal dust. Graffiti decorated the rock in random spots, initials and a few bids for eternity. Jack was here, SLC, AJ + KC 3/8/31, among others.

“1931?” Glenn said. “People been in here that far back? How come more people don’t know about this?”

“Maybe AJ and KC didn’t live to talk about it.” Maci rubbed a black area on the ceiling. “I think this is soot from old fuel lanterns. The graffiti’s the same color, they probably made that with the lanterns, too. I wonder if they knew the cave was here when they dug the tunnel? Or if they just found it by accident?” She panned the light slowly around the room. Narrow sections of cave continued to their left and right. “What’s this?”

A two-foot-square cardboard box sat on an elevated section of rock. The box was open; a bundle of old, musty clothes was bunched up inside.

“Box looks brand new.” Glenn touched the material inside. “These are animal hides. I haven’t known anyone to wear animal skin clothes in my lifetime. These have got to be, at least older than I am.”

“Depends on the people. But look at the beadwork.” Maci flipped a piece of the clothing around to show multi-colored beads embedded around a neckline. “This is careful work. Maybe someone found some Indian artifacts and forgot to take them?”

“Here’s something.” Glenn aimed his light to the ground around the box. A dozen or more glass objects, a deep aqua color, lay at their feet. The beads were of two types, cylindrical shapes one to two inches long and boxier shapes with holes through the center. Glenn put them in his pocket. “Guess we can pick up the box on our way out.”

“Looks like we’ve got two directions to choose from. If you want to keep going.”

“I didn’t want in here in the first place.” He looked at the cave roof with grim eyes and hunched shoulders. “How do we even know it’s stable?”

“We know it’s been standing since 1931, at least.” She pointed to their left, where the cave angled upward. “How about that way?”

Glenn scratched a chalk plus sign on the rock next to the tunnel they came in through. The path was uneven and littered with gravel and rocks of various sizes. The cave narrowed considerably but its dimensions varied in every direction. They frequently had to duck their heads or step over areas of raised stone. They found occasional graffiti and two piles of burned wood from fires; the remnants of an old down-filled pillow green with mildew. Glenn used the chalk to mark their way with plus signs every twenty paces. In places, a horizontal section of cave stretched off past the reach of their lights, too shallow for a person to access.

The shafts of light were all that connected them to the physical world. Only their wristwatches gave them any sense of time. The path in every direction changed in an instant but nothing existed until they tethered it to a light or bumped into it. Glenn recalled those old science fiction movies he watched. The space travelers worried about alien monsters or space viruses or radiation. Now he understood. That was to simplify things for the audience, because the true danger had to be lived through to be believed, the vast blackness itself, an endless and total night that froze the soul.

The cave walls slowly became saturated with moisture. A few drops here and there that gradually turned into a wet cover that gave the walls a range of new colors and a smoothness the dead section of cave lacked. The beginnings of stalactites emerged in bumps across the ceiling. At the same time, they detected a whisper that grew to the echoing sound of a stream.

An abrupt widening of the tunnel took their breath away. They stood in a massive room. With their view limited by the flashlights, they couldn’t get a full sense of the room’s size, easily fifty feet or more across and equally high. Stalactites and stalagmites grew in a multitude of lengths and thicknesses. Some were skinny like drinking straws and some were thin and wide like fabric. Cold, heavy drops of water fell like a light rain. The “floor” and “ceiling” of the room curved like a section of ocean frozen in time. Broad, rippled rock arrangements resembling waterfalls curved along the walls. A stream emerged from a slot high above them and flowed in its bed across the chamber and into a continuation of the main passage.

Glenn even forgot his fear for a moment. He hadn’t really expected to find the McCutcheons in there, but the thought had worried him and this was a damn sight better.

“Have you ever seen the like?” Maci whispered. “I’ve been on some cave tours, but it’s totally different without professional lights and groups of people.” She pointed at a thick column of damp rock. “The way I remember it, they said it takes a thousand years for these formations to grow even a few inches. Something this big, I’m thinking it took maybe ten thousand years or more. I’ve got a rough history of my family going back to the 1850s. That’s not even a hundred-and-fifty years. Can you imagine ten thousand?”

He couldn’t.

Arrangements of smaller rocks on the ground indicated people had been in the cave, but timing was impossible to estimate. Glenn went to the stream, about one foot deep, the clearest water he had ever seen. The stream bed was smooth except for a scattering of gravel. He scooped his free hand in and tasted the water.

“Never had water that good before,” he said.

“Looks like we can go one direction from here,” Maci indicated downstream with her light. “I’d like to explore this area some more. We should have brought cameras. The rock’s pretty slick, do you think we can get up there?” She pointed to the elevated area where the stream emerged.

“Maybe with both hands.” He gestured to a waist-high section of rock. “If we set the lights there we can see what we’re doing.”

They balanced the lights on the rock shelf to get the combined effect of the beams. Glenn got on all fours to inch his way up the slope. He used stalagmites and depressions in the rock for footing. He grunted when a thin stalagmite gave way and he fell against the wet stone. Maci had just started up herself when a rush of heavy footsteps echoed around the chamber. Glenn and Maci barely had time to squint into the lights before the flashlights took flight and made a shaky journey down the tunnel they had come in from. The steps, muffled by the distance, remained audible after the lights had faded from view. It made no difference. Glenn and Maci were in total darkness.

*****

MACI, below Glenn on the slope, grabbed one of his ankles.

“Don’t move,” she said. “Let’s think what we’re doing before we move at all.”

The darkness felt thicker than normal air, like something between air and water. It penetrated their insides and called their own senses into question. They couldn’t distinguish between having their eyes open or closed. A hand held in front of a face might as well have not existed. The dark even confused gravity, making balance tricky to achieve. The darkness was so heavy it muffled sound; in spite of the echoes, their own voices sounded fragile and far away.

“Hello?” Maci shouted. To Glenn, she whispered, “Can we hope it’s just kids playing around and they’ll bring the lights back?”

They sat silent a few seconds. “Don’t seem likely,” was all Glenn could get out.

“We really need our lights back!” Maci yelled. Her voice echoed so much, anyone who might hear her probably couldn’t understand the words. Quietly, she said, “Should’ve turned right instead of left. I’d say we heard two, maybe three sets of footsteps. You agree?”

“Caught me off-guard. I can’t say.”

“And those steps were too heavy for smaller kids, now that I think about it. Full-grown adults, most likely.”

Both were too frightened to know where to begin, but the oppressive silence threatened to overwhelm them if they didn’t keep up a perimeter of communication.

“How confident are you about finding the tunnel we came in through?”

Glenn felt like he shook his head but couldn’t be certain, and Maci wouldn’t have known, either way. “I’m not.”

“Yeah. We saw a lot of side passages. We could wander around in here for years.”

“Helen knows we’re out here, but I didn’t think to mark the entrance on the map. Just a general area.”

Maci sighed. The stream gurgled around them and water dripped from the ceiling. If they sat still long enough they could hear their own hearts beating. Maci splashed her hand in the water, hard enough to find as close as it was, and tapped Glenn’s leg.

“How about this? Remember the direction the stream goes? That looked passable, right?”

“Yeah.”

“What if we follow that? Maybe the stream comes out somewhere else. If the cave gets too small, we turn around and follow the stream back here.”

“Yeah. Okay. That...that makes sense.”

“Let’s work our way over there. Go real slow. Here, take my hand. We’ve got to stay connected. Seriously, no matter what, if we get separated, we’ll never make it.”

“I hear you.”

They crawled, slid, crept over the wet stone. The bitter cold of the stream seeped into their shoes and froze their feet. They moved ahead awkwardly, holding hands every step, waving their walking sticks in front of them and ducking their heads instinctively because everything they couldn’t see could do serious harm.

“I’m trying hard to stay positive,” Maci said. “About what happens if this doesn’t work.”

“I don’t know,” was all Glenn could think to say. The water sloshed around them.

“If we don’t show up, how long before Helen sounds the alarm?”

“Tomorrow morning, I imagine.”

“Careful.” Maci jerked back when her walking stick bumped a low-hanging area of rock overhead, maybe a stalactite. “So, tomorrow, people start looking for us. They’ve got the general area. We found the cave entrance. Maybe they will, too.”

“Could be.”

They stopped now and then to listen. Whoever had taken their lights might still be in the cave.

“We found it by accident,” Glenn reminded her.

“I’m trying not to think about that.”

They stumbled and bobbed their way forward. The tunnel grew shorter; they found out the hard way when Glenn banged his head on limestone. They walked in a crouched position as long as they could. Before long they were on their knees, each holding on to the other and supporting themselves with their free hand.

Time and distance had no meaning. They may have traveled ten feet or a mile. They drank water and refilled their canteens from the stream. They tried not to do the math of how long they could survive without food. The water froze their hands and the stone bruised their knees.

“Seems like as good a time as any to tell you what happened in Chicago,” Maci said out of the blue. “What got me in hot water. The Bureau put me on a task force working with the DEA and the Chicago PD. Major drug bust. Drug enforcement is huge, Glenn. I don’t know if it’s gotten to you yet. The Reagan people are putting the fear of God into everyone. Crack’s a problem in some of the inner cities, but they’re blowing it all out of proportion. Medellin cartels sending cocaine into the country, it’s always their intermediaries that get busted, or killed, and there’s always new ones to take up the business.  You see the Iran-Contra hearings a few days ago? Those two guys in the hearing room held up a sign that said, ‘Ask about cocaine smuggling’? Government’s getting it both ways, they blow up the drug issue to scare the public and get funding. You know the Bureau’s drug enforcement budget is more than ten times what it was in 1980? Then on the other side, they’re neck deep in keeping drugs flowing to fund arms deals. Minimum sentencing and expanded penalties are putting more and more people in prisons. Mostly poor and Black. The hearings aren’t telling us the half of it, Glenn, you can bet on that. Anyway-” her voice caught, showing her fear, but at least she had the courage to talk, more than Glenn had, “anyway, some neighborhoods are getting targeted from every direction, and this one on the south side was one of them. We were after a whole crew of suspects. Turns out, one of the residents is a cousin of mine.” She stopped moving. “You notice this?”

“What is it?”

“Feel the rock. Outside the stream bed. It’s dry.”

He misjudged the distance and banged his hand on the ceiling. Bone dry.

“We came in through a dead section of cave,” Maci said. “Maybe we’re in the same area?”

The stream became deeper and the ceiling lower. After they’d been crawling for what seemed like days, they hit the end of the line.

“Shit,” Maci said. Her voice caught again. It was all Glenn could do to keep breathing.

After hoping a miracle would take them home, Maci straightened her shoulders and said, “I’m a pretty good swimmer. What about you?”

“Not so good.”

“Okay,” she whispered. “Okay.” Neither one noticed how tight they gripped hands. She dropped her walking stick on the cave floor above the stream. “I’m going to go under and have a look. Maybe we can get to the other side. Don’t move.”

“You crazy?” Glenn said. “What if there’s no end? What if you hit your head? Lose your way or something?” He would go near insane if she got lost and left him trapped in there by himself. “You get hurt, how am I supposed to get you out?”

“You got a better idea?”

“We could go back.”

Neither of them took that seriously.

“I can’t hold my breath that long,” she said. “I won’t go far.” She squeezed his hand. “Wish me luck.”

His “Good luck” felt like the most pointless words he’d ever spoken. Maci filled her lungs slowly, breathed out, and repeated that several times. Put her hands against the rock wall for orientation. She sucked in one last breath and ducked her head under. Glenn heard the splash and only the dribbling of the stream after. He counted in his head, 1001, 1002, 1003, but allowing for fear his counting was fast.

His breath got more ragged with every beat. He dropped his own walking stick and moved his hands around under the water, hoping for a sign Maci was still there. The timeless brushing of the current was all he heard over his raspy breaths, each one closer to a sob.

A rush of water and Maci sputtered next to him, coughing and spitting out water.

“You still here?” she choked. They flailed their arms and found each other’s shoulders.

“You all right?” he asked.

“Hit my shoulder. I don’t think it’s bleeding. Hard to be sure.”

Once her breathing caught up with her body’s needs, Maci said, “We can make it. You won’t believe how close it is. It seems like forever cause we can’t see. I swear, it’s just a few seconds.”

“I can’t,” he said. He felt like that kid in his dream, death bearing down on him. “I can’t do it.”

She gripped his shoulders tighter. “You have to. You want to stay here? We’re damn sure not splitting up.”

“No. No, it’s too much-”

She shook him, a force in the darkness that kept his fears from dragging him off. “We’re in this together, Deputy. You really going to send me out there by myself? We need each other if we’re going to keep going. Listen. You take a deep death. Stay low, I mean right on the bottom. Hang on to me. I don’t think it’s even ten feet away. And there’s more room on the other side, we can stand up. You can do this. We can do it together, I know we can.”

He nodded his head, for all the good it did. They oriented themselves toward the passage and took three deep breaths. When they lowered their bodies into the water, Glenn had an impulse to jump back up. Maci jerked him forward. He thrashed about and slammed his back against the cave ceiling. Maci’s estimate of ten feet felt like ten miles; the water stabbed at their flesh like ice picks. Glenn panicked and opened his mouth just as they broke through the other side.

They leaned against each other, afraid to break contact, while they hacked and choked and caught their breath. Glenn was the worse for wear and Maci fumbled till she stood behind him and massaged warmth into his shoulders while he upchucked.

“Told you we’d make it,” she said.

“Still seeing stars,” Glenn muttered. “I’m going to need a few minutes.”

“Kind of glad you were chicken about it. I was, too. Talking you through gave me something else to think about.”

They got their wind back and moved on through a taller section of the cave. The passage was wide enough, they didn’t need to walk in the stream. Even so, the water took ages to dry from their skin and nearly froze them in the meantime. They worked into a routine: slide one foot forward to avoid tripping, reach out to check for low-hanging rocks, slide the other foot forward. They limited their talk to tactics while moving forward without dwelling on worst-case scenarios.

Glenn heard a fluttering sound and froze. “You hear that?”

What sounded like bird wings fluttering grew louder and passed to their side.

“What the hell...?” Maci said. “Hey, now, you think it’s bats?”

“That’s good, isn’t it? Means there’s a way out of here?”

“Seems like it. Can’t be bad, right?”

They wanted to go faster but every time they did one of them tripped or hit a low-hanging stalactite. They were wearing out and still no clue if hours or days had passed.

Maci blinked her eyes. “Am I seeing things? Look ahead.”

A faint patch of gray, a discoloration where no colors should live.

“Light?” Glenn asked.

Darkness had surrounded them so long they couldn’t identify the opening until they stood in front of it. The stream emptied through a crescent-shaped hole into the river. The day had nearly run its course and darkness outside, only partial darkness compared to the cave, had obscured the opening. They pushed away dirt and dead leaves that crumbled onto their heads as they crawled through.

They lay on the ground and looked up the length of trees to the sky above the river. The air was thick with the scents of humidity and soil and open space. The grass and trees created a softness lacking in the hard rock of the cave. A crescent moon toward the east wavered between tree limbs. Half a dozen bats flittered overhead. Glenn thought about vampire movies he’d watched on late-night TV and wondered if maybe the vampires would have been an easier threat than the ancient hole-in-the-ground they’d just climbed out of.

Neither of them spoke. The darkness had bonded them enough that each knew when the other was ready to stand. Based on the current they had emerged somewhere north of their original location. They took their time walking along the river, ignoring all landmarks until they reached the road where the squad car remained undisturbed. Glenn drove them back in silence. Only inside the house, with lights on and Cara jumping around like mad over their long absence, could they see themselves covered with mud, bruises, and dried blood, remnants of the cave’s passive assault on them.

They took turns cleaning off in the bathroom. Maci turned in and Glenn lay on the bed in his own room, where he fell asleep straight away, two things he hadn’t done in ages.

8

Glenn woke with a reminder of why he didn’t sleep in his bedroom most nights. He could have sworn he heard his mother yelling to wake him like when he was a kid, her frizzy hair strung out every which way like she’d been electrocuted, not because she’d just gotten out of bed but because she always looked a mess. She didn’t go in much for alarm clocks and as often as not the Old Man didn’t have a steady job to go to, so some days Glenn struggled to make it to school on time. Days she felt motherly, she’d heat up Eggo frozen waffles in the toaster for him. Soon enough he learned to do it himself. The rare days the Old Man was around and not passed out he might make fried egg sandwiches. Glenn never amounted to much of a student but school was easier to predict than home so those Eggos marked the high point of most of his days. He didn’t need syrup (his mom probably never thought to buy any, either way), just grabbed them and ran. Didn’t matter if he was too early for the bus, he’d gladly kill time alone outside while he ate.

His mom’s screechy voice turned into the phone ringing on top of the dog whining outside his door for her breakfast. Maci’s door was open but no sign of her.

“Hey, Glenn. Sorry to wake you,” Josh Avery said when Glenn answered. “Say, we got kind of a situation with Agent Fontaines...”

*****

BRUISES FROM the cave showed themselves all over Glenn’s body and his back ached from being hunched over so much. He hurried and poured out some food for the dog and put on his uniform.

He didn’t have to drive far. Right as he got onto SR 24 he saw the Indiana State Police vehicle on the side of the road with fields of sweet corn all around, most of the plants over four feet tall and ready to harvest before long. After the cave, he felt adrift in a sea of open land and clear sky. Maci smoldered with her arms crossed against the rear of the car while three broad-shouldered men in state police uniforms and mirrored sunglasses chatted on the driver’s side. Their wide-brimmed hats cast shade over their entire faces. Their arms, pink with sunburn, bulging against the short sleeves of their uniforms reminded Glenn of the solid rock walls of the cave. The dead section of cave.

At least they’d had the sense not to handcuff a Federal agent.

He parked behind the state car and walked across the gravel shoulder.

“Real friendly state you got here,” Maci said. She’d dressed for exercise, with sneakers, a t-shirt, and shorts. A bruise on her forehead told him she felt pain from yesterday, same as he did.

One of the state troopers broke formation and sauntered toward him. “Glenn Haskell, how the hell are you this morning?”

“Hey, Randall.”

State Trooper Randall Martin shook Glenn’s hand, more to show off how much he could bench press than good manners. Randall took off his hat; his blond hair was cut in a Marines-style buzz. The second time Angie had dumped Glenn, it had been for Randall.

Randall was in an expansive mood. He waved his arm toward his cohorts. “This here is Trooper Williams and Trooper Dittmer.” If Glenn hadn’t already known Randall, he would have been hard-pressed to tell the three of them apart. Williams and Dittmer stood behind Randall. All three had a height advantage that forced Glenn to look up to them.

Glenn looked at Maci. “Is there a problem? You know she’s an FBI agent?”

“Well, now, Glenn, that’s why we asked you out here. We were on a routine patrol this morning and came across a Black female running down the road.” Randall spoke in a lower register than the Old Man, but he had the same southern drawl. Before Word War II, auto manufacturers in need of cheap labor brought busloads of workers and their families up from Kentucky. Their descendants hadn’t lost the voice.

“I was jogging,” Maci snapped. “It’s called exercise.”

“You can see,” Randall chuckled, “she has demonstrated a somewhat belligerent attitude. She has no identification on her. Now, we know how much your smaller towns...like Sommersville, for instance...depend on the state police for safety. So when we see a Black female acting suspiciously-”

”Running while Black,” Maci said. “Very suspicious.”

“-why, we take the time to investigate. Just to be certain there’s no crimes being perpetrated.”

“Last thing we want to find out is a crime was committed by a suspect we didn’t apprehend,” Trooper Dittmer said.

“Happens all the time,” Randall said. “Some law enforcement officer stops someone on a simple matter and doesn’t show due diligence in their investigation. They’re generous, lazy, what have you. And then that suspect goes on to carry out a serious crime.”

“Couldn’t live with ourselves,” Williams said. They not only looked alike, they sounded alike.

“Lucky for you ignorance isn’t a crime,” Maci said.

“She’s really a federal agent, Randall,” Glenn said. “Name’s Maci Fontaines. She’s here working on a case.”

“Oh, yes.” Randall turned thoughtful and rubbed his chin. “I seem to recall Angie mentioned something about that. You’re trying to find the family that went missing, isn’t that right?”

“Yeah.”

“How’s that working out for you? Angie said you looked awful lost, last time she talked to you.”

“We’re investigating some things,” Glenn said. “Is Agent Fontaines all right to come with me now?”

“Hell, Glenn, I’ve known you long enough. You vouch for her, we got no problem with that. We can release her to your custody. We’ll waive our right to check in with her home office.”

Maci finally left her position and stood beside Glenn while she addressed Randall. “Your ancestors were so dirt poor, I bet they worked for the same massa’ as my slave ancestors, you du-”

“All right,” Glenn grabbed her arm and tried to pull her away. He only managed it because she let him; she could easily have overpowered him if she’d wanted. “All right. Thanks for being so understanding, Randall.”

“And,” Randall raised his hands to show he wasn’t finished, “providing you make sure the little lady carries proper identification on her at all times. I need your word on that, Glenn.”

“Sure, we got no problem with that,” Glenn said. Maci turned her back to the troopers. “Sorry again for the inconvenience.”

“You’re a good man, Glenn,” Randall smirked. “I’ll be sure and say hi to Angie for you.”

Glenn thought they were finished but Maci spun and launched a front kick with such perfect form and ferocity, he halfway thought he’d imagined it. She pulled back about two inches short of Randall’s face. The trooper put his hand on his firearm but nearly fell on his behind backing away from Maci, who had already started back toward Glenn’s car.

“Show your face in Chicago sometime, you redneck,” Maci said over her shoulder. “You’d last about five minutes. And don’t threaten a federal officer again if you know what’s good for you.”

Glenn drove them away before the troopers had time to change their minds. The brain trust trio watched them go; the sunglasses hid their emotions but Glenn had a fair idea.

“It’s a crime for a Black woman to exercise around here?” Maci said. Glenn started to respond but she banged her fist against the passenger door and kept going. “I felt like going for a run, what the hell’s wrong with that? I didn’t want to wake you, so I left quietly. Minding my own business, and those Neanderthals got on my ass. Followed me in their car forever before they stopped me. I guess they had to make sure I wasn’t a terrorist army or some shit.” She beat her fist again and said, “God damn it!”

They’d nearly reached Glenn’s driveway before Maci could speak in a normal tone. “Why did you apologize to them?”

He looked away from her. “What else was I going to do? I don’t amount to one of them. When you’re gone, I still got to live with these people. Better just to make peace and get away.”

They went to their separate corners in the house and got dressed, Maci in a business suit and Glenn in his uniform.

Driving to the sheriff’s office, Maci fumed and Glenn still couldn’t bring himself to look at her.

“They’re just looking for the easiest target,” he said. “I don’t know if it’s small town minds or what. Don’t make it okay, but it’s not really about skin color. I mean it is, but not like wearing robes and burning crosses. It’s about people here always putting others down. Anyone. They pick on me till someone like you shows up and gives ‘em a distraction. Competing against each other. Someone’s got to win and someone’s got to lose. Randall and them guys, they figure if they’re not in the middle of winning, they’re losing, and they go find somebody to blame it on. This town...” He laughed. “World hardly looks at this town, except to look down every few years and see if we got something worth taking. That’s who we’re losing against. I don’t know why they can’t figure that out. Just easier to pick on you and me, I guess.”

He parked in front of the office.

“Those rednecks might not be professional racists like the Klan,” Maci said. “But all it takes is a few more people like me being in their line of sight full time. Then they get organized. And it’s not a lot of steps from there to a lynching.”

Glenn looked out the window. “Never thought about it like that before.”

They sat quiet for a time. Maci stretched in the passenger seat.

“I’m going to be feeling that kick,” Maci said. “I was hurting enough already.”

“Only time I saw anyone kick that high was in the movies,” Glenn said. “Or on Wide World of Sports.”

She looked at him over the tops of her sunglasses. “You want to get breakfast? The Bureau’s treat?”

“Maybe we ought to talk to the sheriff first? Catch him while it’s still early.”

They met in Howard’s office. The sheriff, in his soft-spoken way, was nearly beside himself when they described the experience in the cave.

“The real question is,” he pondered, “was it a prank, as you’re suggesting, Maci, or...” he stroked his chin, “...was it directed at you?”

“If they were after us,” Maci said, “it means someone was none too happy about us being there.”

“Perhaps there’s a homeless encampment in the cave,” the sheriff said. “From what you’ve described, people could exist there for years and no one would know. Glenn, do you think Dennis would have some insight?”

“We mentioned the cave to him,” Glenn said. “He said he’d seen the entrance. I’ll ask him, but I’m pretty sure he’d have told us if he knew about people living out there.”

“I’ve been searching my memory,” Howard said. “I was young, but I seem to recall some trouble in the 1950s. A small group of Miami Indians wanted to retrieve artifacts from land that had been taken from them years ago. Some of the land the state purchased. The Miami...they could have taught our local farmers a thing or two, from what I’ve heard. Most of them were forced to leave the area. Or they decided to leave, under the circumstances. Something happened, though...” He drummed his thick fingers on the desktop. “But my memory isn’t what it used to be. Lillie Oberlin would be the person to ask, she probably knows as much of the town’s history as anyone.”

“How is she coming along?” Glenn asked.

Howard gave his head a sorrowful shake. “She is recovering from the hip fracture. Of course, she already had the limp. Her doctor says she’ll never regain enough mobility to live independently. She plans to go to an assisted living facility in Indianapolis, a larger facility so she’ll have first-rate care in the future. She appointed a historian from the area to assess her possessions for historic value. The rest will be auctioned. Most likely, the boarding house will be sold.”

“Historian?” Glenn asked. “Mitchell over at Sunrise Manor was telling me about a historian, name of Jeffrey Slocum.”

The sheriff tapped a hand against his desk. “That’s the man. I knew someone was trying to launch a county historical museum, but I’ve never met Jeffrey myself.”

Glenn and Maci left with a commitment to talk to Slocum the next day. Glenn exchanged a mournful look with Helen on their way out.

“What was that for?” Maci asked as they stepped out onto the sidewalk.

“He’s looking worse,” Glenn said with tight lips. “Sounds worse. He’s always kept up with people in town, everything that happens. Like a one-man census. Wasn’t long ago, he’d have known all about this Slocum character. New guy in the area looking to open a historical museum? Sheriff would’ve met him and known half his life story by now.”

“I’m not trying to go negative on you,” Maci said. “But everything changes. What happens when the sheriff isn’t sheriff any more?”

Glenn didn’t have an answer.

*****

ON AN AFTERNOON of full sun, Maci watched with good humor, and Cara, based on memories of her old life, watched with intense hope of food when Glenn banged around in the backyard shed. A crash of metal and wood sent a cloud of dust out the door that barely hung on its rusty hinges.

“Holler if we need to send in a search party,” she said.

Glenn inched out the door carrying a rusty bicycle in both hands. The chain needed oil, both tires were flat, and a straw basket fastened to the wide handlebars had mostly disintegrated. A low-budget brand name was printed on the stocky black frame.

“You planning on racing that?” Maci smiled.

“The Old Man got his license pulled a few times for DUIs.” Glenn frowned at the flat tires. “He rode this around when he couldn’t get rides off other people. Till he hurt his back. I thought there was a pump in there somewhere...”

He went back in the shed and came out with a metal floor pump, a rusty metal cylinder with a handle on one end and a rubber tube off the other.

“Hope these tires don’t have leaks...” He screwed the pump’s rubber tube on to the front tire valve, stood on the foot pads at the base of the pump, and repeated the pull-push handle operation a few times to get some air in the tire.

“Really, what is...this is a weird time to take up cycling, is all,” Maci said.

Glenn squeezed the tire to be sure it held air. He kept his head down while he finished filling the tire. “That thing with the state troopers this morning. I figure if I’m with you, they got no call to say anything.”

Maci opened her mouth but realized nothing she said would change the situation.

“I can’t keep up with you on foot.” He connected the pump to the back tire and tested it with a few squeezes of air. He stopped filling the tire and stood straight. “I know what they’re doing is wrong. Just...don’t want any trouble, is all.”

“I don’t want any trouble, either,” she said. “Sometimes you can’t avoid it.”

*****

THEY PICKED UP dinner at Hopewell’s as usual but neither one felt like talking so they sat on the sofa while the dog stared at their food. The Indianapolis station showed The Lost Missile, a blurry old black-and-white science-fiction movie. An alien ship came to earth and when a European country tried to shoot it down it only made matters worse by spreading radiation all over creation. (“It has to be an Eastern bloc country,” Maci said. “Communism fails, and America will save the day. Want to bet?”) They’d got to the part where the fiancée of the American scientist broke up with him because he was too busy saving the world to find time to get married – “See how exceptional our men-folk are?” Maci looked triumphant – when the phone rang.

When Glenn answered, a coarse, syrupy voice greeted him that wouldn’t have been half as irritating if he didn’t recognize it. “Why, good evening. I’m calling for the lovely Maci Fontaines. She gave me her phone number and invited me to call on her.”

“She didn’t invite you to do any such thing,” Glenn said. “This is your son, you old fool.”

The syrup dried up. “What the hell are you doing there?”

“You think FBI agents are stupid? She gave you my number to keep you from pestering her.”

“Well, shoot,” the Old Man said to himself. “That’s five bucks I owe Walt.”

“I forgot to ask you about something the other day.” Glenn figured he might as well get something useful out of the interruption. “You ever hear of someone named Daniel Fremont? Local guy from years back, might have been real well off? May have worked with Mr. Oberlin who set up the bank? I think he was in the picture I tried to show you.”

After so much silence Glenn thought the Old Man hadn’t heard him, he repeated the name. “Fremont? May have even done some work with your dad, if-”

“What do you keep asking these damn fool questions for?” the Old Man asked. “Hadn’t you ought to be putting all your time into finding that family? I don’t know no Fremont. Never heard of him.”

Glenn hung up after the line went dead.

“Families, right?” Maci asked from the sofa.

Glenn stood in the doorframe between the kitchen and the living room. “He was quiet too long after I asked. He’s heard of Fremont. Why wouldn’t he want to talk about it?”

Maci had no answer.

“How can a town with so much gossip have so many secrets?” Glenn said. “Nothing happens here, except for all the things I don’t know about.”

Maci turned from the TV and leaned forward on the couch. “Some secrets aren’t secrets at all. They just seem that way cause you’re the last one to know.”

*****

GLENN WAS ASLEEP on the couch when Maci woke him at sunrise, dressed in running gear. “You said you wanted to go.”

He fed Cara; the dog wolfed down her food and jumped around them with such enthusiasm that Glenn decided to bring her along. He dragged the bike around to join Maci and Cara in the driveway. A quarter moon hung in the west as sunrise expanded in the east. The grass shone with fresh dew. Maci did some stretching exercises and set off running. Glenn struggled on the bike and nearly toppled over a few times until he got the hang of it. “Can’t remember the last time I rode one of these,” he said. Afraid to be noticed watching Maci, he kept his attention in about every other possible direction.

Robins hopped across lawns, hunting worms in the morning light. Maci’s feet clip-clopped on the asphalt. Cara ran alongside them, overjoyed, stopping to sniff the ground at random intervals. Before long, sweat dripped from their foreheads. Daylight rose up around them and restored color to the world. On the edge of town they passed a cemetery where old, crumbling stone grave markers mingled with smooth new granite additions. Sparrows fidgeted across the tops of the markers.

“I’m guessing that’s the town’s only cemetery?”Maci panted.

“Yeah,” Glenn said. “My mom and grandparents are buried there. Haven’t been there since my mom’s funeral.”

After the cemetery, twenty or more black and white Holstein cows stood behind a barbed wire fence in a grassy field. The cows chewed grass and gave lazy looks to the passersby. Cara ran to the fence and growled at what must have looked like big dogs to her. Not knowing what to make of the non-responsive creatures, she resumed trailing after Maci and Glenn.

“Look like the same cows that were there when I was a kid,” Glenn said. “Land never seems to change around here. Same buildings, same fields. Trees even all look the same.”

“Stability’s not always a bad thing,” Maci said. “I could’ve used a little more stability growing up. We had to move once when I was little because the building we lived in was demolished. The city called it urban renewal.”

“You mean, just like that?” Glenn stared at her. “They just up and tore down your home?”

“Happens to a lot of people. We found another home. It ended up better than the first, but a lot of people didn’t get lucky like that. You living in the same house where you grew up, that’s an uncommon amount of stability.”

They watched the landscape, passing a decomposing log, four foot thick and overgrown with vines, where a trio of cows lay.

“That tree fell...must have been when I was five or six,” Glenn said. “Heavy storms knocked it down. It’s been there rotting away all this time.”

A wolf whistle behind them and they both turned their heads. Glenn near turned the handle bars ninety degrees and would have hit the pavement if Maci hadn’t reached out to steady him. Randall and his cohorts had idled up behind them in their highway patrol car. The windows were rolled down and Randall stuck his head out as they drove past, one arm leaning on the steering wheel and the other on the doorframe.

“You know we’re just messing with you.” Randall grinned behind his mirrored sunglasses. “You all be real careful, you hear?” He hit the gas and the car sped past them and toward the horizon.

Maci didn’t change her pace. “Who’s Angie?” she asked.

Glenn brought his attention back to the road. “What?”

“Randall, right? Your brain-trust friend? Yesterday, he talked about someone named Angie. Like he was going out of his way to mention the name.”

“Yeah, I reckon he was,” Glenn said. “She’s someone I went out with in high school. It was serious. Or, I thought it was serious. She was the prettiest girl in school, I should have known better. She strung me along for a while and I didn’t know left from right. She was going out with another guy on the side and dumped me for him.”

“She treated you like shit and you should have known better? Glenn, come on.”

“Me and her got together again...I guess it’s been more than ten years ago. Fooled me again. She left me for,” he nodded the direction the state troopers had driven, “Randall. Told me about everything he’s got that I don’t. They got a kid now. Not married, though.”

“So he throws it in your face now and then to keep you in your place?” Having forgotten to monitor their distance, Maci surveyed the landscape and did a little mental math. “We can turn back here.”

Maci stopped to scratch Cara’s ears while Glenn turned around by putting his feet to the ground and lifting the bike frame.

“Was she really all that?” Maci wiped sweat from her forehead. “I understand, boys get goo-goo eyes and lose their minds. Would you really have been better off with her? You don’t have to answer, it’s just you seem to spend a lot of time living in the past.”

Glenn opened his mouth to speak. He tried a second time. He just couldn’t get any words out. Finally, he settled for, “I don’t know.”

*****

A SEVEN-MILE DRIVE down SR 24 took them to Concord, only a bit larger than Sommersville but being next to the interstate, it became home to the library and, before cutbacks, a rail stop for freight. The Craftsman-style library had high ceilings, heavy wood doors, and large windows in the front, and a central area where elderly men sat reading newspapers. The librarian directed them to a room in the back of the building. A slender, dark-skinned young man with black hair in a button-down shirt and jeans welcomed them into the room.

“Jeffrey Slocum,” he shook their hands. His eyes looked older than the rest of him, eternally focused on the time-frames of history. “Sorry for the mess.”

A small table and chairs in the center of the room was surrounded by wide wooden shelves piled with books and what looked like random junk at first glance. Worn clothing, wood and metal implements, antique radios and clocks, glassware, and Indian artifacts of stone mixed together in a jumble of time periods. They sat at the circular table that looked to have come from a classroom, a bit too low for grown adults.

“My latest acquisitions,” Slocum said. “I’ve got a couple of units at a storage facility packed full. I’m trying to put together a county historical museum. My degree is in library science but I minored in history and that’s my real interest. The library has been really supportive, and financial donations are starting to come in. It’s slow going, but if we can get a few wealthy donors on board, I think we’ll get serious momentum. People think history is big events or important dates, but most history is ordinary people living their lives. People forget how much has happened in this county, I’d hate for it all to be lost to time.

“Anyway, I was really intrigued by your call,” Slocum said. “Sommersville, yeah, the little town that could, right?”

Glenn just nodded but Maci asked, “Like the little engine that could?”

“It’s just that Sommersville has been passed over by about everyone over the years,” Slocum said. To Glenn, he said, “No offense.”

Glenn made a not offended gesture with his hand. “It’s the truth.”

“You can almost see the development of the country in everything that almost happened in Sommersville.” Slocum counted off on his fingers, “The canal, the railroad, textile factories, lumber, furniture manufacturing, mining, automotive plants, the interstate. It’s like a cloud over the town, you might think it earned some bad karma along the way.”

“Some people must have prospered,” Maci said. “I was staying at Lillie Oberlin’s boarding house. Her family made good money, from what I can tell.”

Slocum looked down frequently in what the others took as an introspective manner.

“They made money,” he said. “I’m not sure how much happiness the family experienced. I know Miss Oberlin somewhat. She asked me to assess her estate and offered to contribute anything suitable for the museum. I even talked with her about making the boarding house the museum’s home. The town has to approve the zoning. They may not consider that profitable enough.”

“We come across this photograph. We’re trying to identify these men.” Glenn took the black-and-white photo from his pocket and placed it in front of Slocum. He slid an index finger across the faces. “We think this is Miss Oberlin’s grandfather, who founded the bank. I’m pretty sure this one here is my own grandfather. This one, maybe a fellow named Emmett Crandall, he still lives outside of town. This one we thought could be Daniel Fremont, who I guess worked with Miss Oberlin’s grandfather. The other one we’re not sure about. Any chance you can confirm if we’re on the right track?”

“You’re on exactly the right track.” Slocum went to a row of books and photo albums on one of the shelves. He pulled out a heavy bound photo album, thicker than any book Glenn had ever seen, and thumped it on to the table. After browsing a few seconds, Slocum laid the album open to an assortment of black and white photos of various quality. One was a formal portrait of a man in a business suit who looked exactly like one of the men in Glenn’s snapshot. “This is Daniel Fremont. He was fairly prominent in Sommersville until about the early 1940s. I haven’t pieced together what happened, but he left for Indianapolis around that time and never came back. He primarily invested in real estate, but he used the real estate to get a foothold into other businesses. So when Matthew Oberlin – that’s him in your photo – when he founded the bank, it was in one of Fremont’s properties. The old general store, the one that became Hopewell’s, that was a Fremont-owned building. He leased land to farmers. Being a partner in the bank, he got preferential loan deals. A lot of commerce in Sommersville would never have taken off without his support, but,” Slocum rubbed invisible currency between his fingers, “he got a cut of all the action. If he loaned a business money and they succeeded, he collected interest. If it failed, he became part owner of the assets. Didn’t matter what happened, he profited. I guess that’s how lenders have always operated.”

“And Mr. Crandall?” Maci asked. “Do you know if that’s him?”

“Him I’m not so familiar with. His name pops up now and then, but I don’t have any real history on him.” Slocum leaned forward so his eyes were only a few inches from the image.  “The other faces I don’t recognize. Nice photograph, though, do you mind if I make a copy of it?”

“Help yourself,” Glenn said. “You familiar with where old man Crandall lives? Big piece of property north of town?”

“Not precisely, but I know the general area. A lot of that land was taken from the Miami. The Miami came here from the Great Lakes area in the 1700s, they mostly settled along the Wabash River, and the Salem River. Over time, they were forced into smaller and smaller areas. But they were some of the most adaptable people. Between overhunting and forest clearing, settlers killed off a lot of the big game animals the Miami depended on. That drove the Miami to rely more on waterfowl, and all sorts of smaller animals that lived near the rivers, woodchucks, porcupines. And farming, they always farmed, but on a subsistence basis, not the production-oriented farming the Europeans developed. They fished more. Collected maple sugar. And there were these beautiful medicinal plants in the river basin...you can’t imagine how fertile the river was before industry started polluting it. Dog fennel, bloodroot, goldenseal. They did whatever they had to, to survive, but they generally didn’t see the point of doing more than that. Whites came in, and they looked at everything in terms of financial schemes, so to them the Miami looked lazy.

“After the Revolutionary War, Congress passed the Ordinance of 1785, and started forming townships and selling public land to settlers. Land developers moved west. So you’ve got this combination of settlers looking to make money and these,” he made an air quotes gesture, “lazy Miami tying up big pieces of land.” Slocum pushed the palms of his hands together.

“A lot of the Miami had to move west,” Slocum said. “They ended up in Oklahoma. They’re still the only federally recognized Miami nation. Those that stayed in Indiana were mostly over near Peru, on the Wabash. The Indiana Miami are still trying to become federally recognized. Anyway, the Miami family that lived on the land you’re talking about...and it was a big, extended, family...they were forced to give up the whole property. I mean, it was a sale, they were paid for it, but I’m sure they got well below market rates. I haven’t looked up the details of the transaction, but it was sometime in the 1930s. I’ve done some research, and as far as I can tell, the family was never heard from again. There were at least twenty of them. I assume they moved west, but I haven’t found any record of where they went or what happened to them.”

“Is it possible Daniel Fremont bought the land?” Maci asked. “His estate is listed as the current owner.”

“Possible, yeah,” Slocum said. “The transaction history is public record, though not all the records still exist. Like I said, I haven’t researched it other than trying to learn where the family ended up. I know the state of Indiana purchased some of that land for a nature preserve in the fifties, I don’t remember the exact year.”

“If the Miami lived out there,” Glenn said, “they’d have known the lay of the land, wouldn’t they?”

“They didn’t have a lot of time for formal boundaries, if that’s what you’re asking. They were respectful of others, but they lived off the land and tried to get along with settlers the best they could.”

Glenn took the beads from the cave out of his pocket. “You come across any records of a cave on that land? Near the river?”

“A cave?” Slocum examined the beads, rolled the glass around his palms. “Did you find these in a cave?”

Maci and Glenn nodded.

“These are trading beads,” Slocum said. “They came from Europe, but they got passed around by communities engaged in trade for furs, or food supplies, what have you. Fairly common, but still a nice find. We have some for the museum, but we’ll always take donations, if you decide you don’t want them.”

“What about the cave?” Maci asked.

“Right, a few personal narratives and oral histories have survived, but there’s not much left to guide us. There are rumors of a cave, though. It comes across more in mythical terms, a proving ground for the brave, a home of friendly or evil spirits, birth-canal types of analogies. I assumed it was just a creative way of describing the Salem River. But if it’s a literal cave,” Slocum looked at the floor and shook his head. “It hasn’t spoken for many years.”

“Do you believe that?” Maci asked. “The spirits interpretation?”

“No,” Slocum said. “But the Miami...all the native people...they lived by a language the settlers never understood. A language of seasons and crops and animal migrations and the flow of the river. It was a lot simpler than spoken language, but more complex in some ways. It wasn’t a perfect system. The early Indiana nations, Miami, Potawatomi, Kaskaskia, they burned forestland to create clearings for easier hunting. It wasn’t a sustainable practice, but it was on such a small scale. It wasn’t commoditized destruction like we have. You know the Indiana state seal has a white man chopping down a tree with an ax, and a buffalo that looks to be running away? Destruction is in our symbols, it’s how we define ourselves. The Miami took what they needed and left the rest. It wasn’t perfect, but it was maybe the most perfect human habitation anyone has come up with. That kind of subsistence living is dangerous, it’s why capitalist America had to get rid of them.”

“Dangerous?” Glenn asked. “Don’t sound like they hurt anyone.”

“It showed a better way,” Slocum said. He still held the glass beads and worked them around in his hands. “They didn’t need land regulations or taxation. Cars, VCRs, fenced-in yards, blood pressure medicine, none of that. The American power establishment couldn't let that example survive. People would have abandoned capitalism left and right. They had to be killed. Or driven off.”

Slocum handed the beads to Glenn with a sigh. “Sorry, that’s more than you came here for. I’m biased. My grandmother was half Miami. Even she didn’t know what happened to many of them. So I’m technically one-eighth descended from the Miami people. It seems backwards, but most people are impressed when I tell them that. White man’s hypocrisy – pure indigenous blood is inferior, but fractionally indigenous endows me with virility or courage or what have you.

“Anyway, the cave. The Miami weren’t cave-dwellers, but if they knew about it, they might have explored it or stored food in it. They could have lost the beads there, or someone else could have taken them there. If the cave has stories to tell, you might find more than beads. If it exists, I’d love to see it sometime.”

Slocum stood and pulled a leather binder from one of the shelves. He searched it a few seconds and lay it open on the table to a faded newspaper clipping. The headline said Commune or Communists? Group Tries to Open Collective Farm. An image, blurred with the grain of older newspaper printing, showed twelve men and women, Blacks and whites, arm-in-arm and all smiling. They stood outside in what looked to be a field, wearing coveralls, boots, and plaid work shirts. A few of them wore straw hats.

“This was early 1957,” Slocum said. “Twelve people tried to establish what amounted to a commune. Mostly college dropouts, some of them from Indiana University. You can see from the photo, it was a diverse group for this area in the fifties. They wanted to buy land in the county and start a collective farm. Dairy and eggs, mostly, but some crops, too. It’s kind of an outlier, because the idea of utopianism in America had pretty well died off by then, and the hippy commune movement didn’t take off until the sixties. I guess the waves were there, though,” with a shy smile, he raised a hand and bobbed it up and down to simulate the motion of water, “SDS was just up north at the University of Michigan in the early 1960s when they issued the Port Huron statement.”

“Wouldn’t these kids,” Maci pointed to the news clipping, “have been doing what the Miami did? Living off the land, off the grid?”

“Basically,” Slocum nodded. “They had a community spin on it, they planned to sell milk to local markets. Tours for school kids. Can you imagine? Turning grade school kids on to socialist living? Here, in the fifties?” Slocum shook his head and looked back to the floor. “No, that was never going to happen.”

“What did happen?” Glenn asked.

“They couldn’t buy the land,” Slocum said. “Nobody would sell to them. That’s about the time the state stepped in and took over the whole area. It wasn’t just the hippies that were after that land. A lumber company wanted it. Private investors wanted in. When I think about it, I’m really surprised the state didn’t give it to the lumber company. That would have been a prized business.”

“What happened to the college kids?” Maci asked. “Did they try somewhere else?”

“I actually interviewed one of them.” Slocum scanned the photo and pointed to one of the young men’s faces. “Roger Nunn. Retired accountant, if you can believe that. He said three of their group just up and left. They disappeared one day, never said goodbye, no cards or letters. He said he felt betrayed at the time. He and the other eight drifted on to other things. He said, looking back now, it’s not that surprising. They were all fairly transient and probably wouldn’t have stuck together on a farm in the long run.”

Slocum closed the binder and returned it to the shelf. “Crazy, right? Like I said, a lot has happened here.”

They left Slocum with thanks and his assurance they could call on him any time. They drove back with the windows rolled down, the wind stirred up by the cruiser cooling them on a hot, sunny day.

“I was wrong before,” Maci said. “People do have a way of vanishing around here. Makes you wonder if the McCutcheons are just carrying on the tradition.”

Glenn’s head was spinning over all the pieces that he couldn’t fit together. “You think there’s...you think those are all connected?”

“I can’t imagine how,” she said. “It’s weird, though, right? Small town and these people over the years just skipped out? Never heard from again? I will say, I’m more convinced than ever, whatever happened to the McCutcheons has something to do with that land. We’re going to have to go back.”

Glenn squirmed in the driver’s seat. “Not back in that cave, though.”

Maci’s agreement was only half-hearted.

9

The next morning they hit the road for the one-hour drive south to Indianapolis. Josh would be on call while Glenn was gone for the day. Maci wore a business suit. Other than his uniforms and jeans, Glenn only had a black suit he’d bought in the seventies for funerals. He had one tie but Maci told him it wouldn’t be necessary for where they were going. Leaving town, Glenn pointed out the Junction Mart gas station/convenience store where Angie worked; it amounted to a small truck stop mostly frequented by traffic to and from the interstate. Maci wasn’t impressed.

“I been thinking more about this meditation you were telling me about,” Glenn said as they drove down a state road with two lanes in each direction, separated by a grassy median.  Despite the state’s reputation as flat-land, the terrain wasn’t completely level. The road drifted up and down in gradual slopes, sometimes almost too subtle to notice. They passed groves of hickory, ash, and other trees, fields deep green from summer rains, and small towns not that different from Sommersville. “You think you could tell me a little more about it?”

“Sure.”

He fidgeted a bit before talking again. “I tried it a couple of times, like you said. Just breathing and thinking about that. But... I have these dreams. I mean, it’s like the same dream, and I keep having it. When I tried meditating, that dream just came to me, real strong. Like a...like a real thing. Guess that sounds crazy.”

“No, not crazy. Let’s talk about it over lunch.”

Glenn’s shoulders tensed when they got into the city. Even outside of downtown, where the terrain was more suburban than city, he felt like a visitor to another country.

“Maybe I should drive?” Maci gave him a playful tap on the shoulder.

“It just seems to go on forever,” he said. “I know it’s not far, but I can count on one hand the number of times we came here while I was growing up.”

They found the Law Offices of Jefferson & Franklin (“Two founders?” Maci had said. “Isn’t that a little much?”) in a dressed-up strip mall with faux wood balconies and gables that looked like a Swiss chalet made by Fisher-Price. Maci pointed to a silver Jaguar and a dark green Mercedes parked prominently in front of the office.

“Simple digs,” she said. “But these guys are making good money.”

A blond receptionist in a tight dress took them to Jefferson’s small office, a maelstrom of files and books with a large window that looked onto a row of evergreen shrubs. The attorney came from behind a green metal desk that looked to have been built in the 1950s.

They shook hands and made introductions all around. Jefferson had a swarthy, pockmarked face and bushy eyebrows, and wore a rumpled suit with a loosened tie. He fiddled with a fountain pen as they talked. They sat around the desk. Sparrows jumped around in the shrubs outside. Maci opened the case file in her lap.

“I know we spoke on the phone, Agent Fontaines,” Jefferson said. Glenn had insisted Maci make the appointment. (“You sound a lot more polished than I do.”) “I still don’t entirely understand your purpose. Is this an official investigation?”

“It’s not an official FBI investigation,” Maci said. “I’m strictly here in support of a local investigation in Sommersville. It’s Deputy Haskell’s case. We’re really just here as a formality. Getting all our paperwork in order, you understand.”

“I tell you,” Glenn leaned forward and put his elbows on his knees. His voice had grown noticeably more southern. “I hardly ever get down here to the big city. I appreciate your time just for giving us the excuse to visit.”

Maci arched her eyebrows at Glenn but Jefferson was distracted, giving Glenn a long, studied look.

“Of course, Deputy,” he smiled. “Anything I can do to help.”

“We’re just a small town,” Glenn said. “We don’t get much call to talk with professional people like yourself, so if you could keep this as simple as possible.”

One side of Jefferson’s mouth curled up amiably. He leaned back in his chair. “I’ll do my best. You’re interested in the Fremont estate?”

“Yes, sir, that’s the one. I guess Daniel Fremont was an important man in Sommersville. We had a family go missing and their boat was recovered on land Mr. Fremont owns outside town. Just happenstance, I know. But, like Agent Fontaines said, we’ve got to make our paperwork look good.”

“You mean the estate owns it.” Jefferson said.

“Beg your pardon?”

“Mr. Fremont passed away years ago,” Jefferson smiled. “Any ownership interest would lie with the estate.”

“Well, yes.” Glenn touched a hand to his forehead. “Of course, you’re right. You see why I need this kept simple.”

“Why did Mr. Fremont’s assets go to a privately managed estate?” Maci asked. “Wouldn’t someone of his importance have wanted to keep his wealth in the family?”

“That was before my time,” Jefferson said. “But as I understand it there was no family. I don’t believe he left any heirs.”

“So everything Mr. Fremont owned at the time of his death,” Glenn said, “went into this estate?”

“The estate has various land and equity holdings,” Jefferson said. “I’m not at liberty to provide details, but, of course, land ownership is a matter of public record.”

“Who manages the estate?” Maci asked. “We understand you’re the executor, but who actually owns it?”

Jefferson leaned back and raised his arms with his hands resting behind his neck. “It’s controlled by a holding company.”

“A holding company?” Glenn shook his head with an I don’t understand look.

“It’s like this.” Jefferson stretched to his desk and picked up a pad of yellow Post-It notes. He stuck three of the blank notes in a row on the table. “Say you’ve got a collection of businesses. They might do anything. Hypothetically, let’s say you’ve got real estate, a savings and loan, a lumber company, coal and natural gas mining, hotels and restaurants. What have you.” He set the remaining note pad above the row of papers. “You can organize all of those businesses under one corporate management by forming a holding company. They’re all under the same ownership, but each company is a separate legal entity for tax purposes.”

“So Daniel Fremont’s estate is one of those businesses?” Maci asked.

“Essentially.” He shrugged with a genial smile toward Glenn. “Of course, there’s a lot more to it, but that’s the simple version.”

“What is the name of the holding company?” Glenn asked.

“Ah, my responsibility is only the administration of the Fremont estate. Beyond that, I’m required to claim attorney-client privilege.”

Maci shuffled the papers. “I believe that completes our checklist.”

Glenn slapped his knees and moved to stand. “I reckon that’s all we need. I’m sure you’re a busy man, Mr. Jefferson, we sure do thank you for your time.”

Outside, Maci asked, “Was there a smart cop-dumb cop routine I was supposed to know about?”

“Sorry, I got nervous,” Glenn said. “Fell back on something the sheriff told me. He said if you play dumb, sometimes people will tell you more than they want. Playing dumb’s not so hard for me. Guess it didn’t work, though.”

Maci laughed. She took the driver’s seat in the cruiser. “Maybe it did. He told us Daniel Fremont had no heirs. His estate’s still making money for this holding company. The state department of commerce must have public records about that. The records would be here in Indianapolis, we might as well look while we’re here.”

“Should be downtown,” Glenn said. “We can park in one of the garages.”

Maci started the engine and eased toward the parking lot exit. “He told us more than that. He said the holding company has interests in real estate, finance, mining, lumber... I don’t think he was stretching his imagination. That wasn’t hypothetical.”

*****

THEY FOUND the Department of Commerce offices in a glass-fronted office building in the heart of downtown. No one seemed much interested in helping them find business records, especially for a vaguely-defined investigation conducted by a small-town deputy with no warrant. Maci’s FBI badge didn’t help much once it identified her as being out of Chicago and not the Indianapolis field office. After repeating their introductions to a series of low-level bureaucrats, they eventually found a clerk, a tall young man with a mass of dark hair that hung over his eyes, in a budget-furnished records room, who agreed to pull the documents they sought.

“These businesses were formed a long time ago,” the young man said from behind a counter. Doors behind him led to long rows of filing cabinets. He slumped thick binders onto the counter. Maci and Glenn sat at a small table to search the records. Maci had more business sense, and more investigative experience, so took charge of the effort. After two hours they left with a manila folder stuffed with letter- and legal-sized photocopies.

Agreeing it was time for a late lunch, Maci said, “You like White Castle, right?” Before he could answer, she said, “We’re going to White Castle.” After asking the parking garage attendant for directions, Maci drove them to the nearest site of the fast food restaurant with white exterior and crenelated roof and towers. They had missed the lunch rush and the restaurant was quiet. They sat in a booth with two trays full of small, square burgers, overlooking the parking lot and the urban rambling of the state’s capital. Glenn peeled off his suit coat, feeling like he’d escaped a straitjacket, and laid it on his side of the booth.

“You know White Castle designed their restaurants to look like the Chicago Water Tower?” Maci sipped a soft drink. “Which I assume you’ve never seen. It’s a cool old tower on the Magnificent Mile. Built in the 1800s. And here they copied it in a fast food chain.” She held up one of the tiny burgers. “My dad used to take me on weekends. I love these.”

“Went to White Castle a lot while I was going to the academy,” Glenn said. “Seems like a long time ago. One thing I liked about the time I spent here. In Sommersville, I always feel like people are staring at me. Like I don’t belong somehow. In the city, I just felt like...nobody cared. Felt like I blended in more.”

“It’s cultural. Cultural selection. Sommersville’s the kind of place where you...your personality traits...the town’s decided that’s not what they’re looking for. You could go someplace else, even a different small town, or another country, whatever, someplace that favors the stuff that makes you who you are. One of the reasons Belize was so good for me; I tend to be on the hyper side. Pace there helped me slow down. You may have noticed I have a bit of a temper,” she grinned. “That’s one of the things that drew me to meditation. You should have seen me in my twenties. There were days I spun around like the Tasmanian Devil. Someone like you, it’s easier to blend in in a big city, just cause there’s more people, more room for different types.”

“I don’t know if I could get used to that many people, though.”

“Indy’s pretty flat as cities go,” Maci said. “A city’s what I prefer, more often than not. Now, I have had some good times outside of cities. I love the dunes on the Indiana side of Lake Michigan. Places where I feel connected to something organic. But, small towns, man, I don’t know. I’m not knocking Sommersville, but I always get the most stares in small towns. Those stares are different than you get. There’s attack dogs and rope behind the stares I get. Too much bad history, like those yokels that pulled me over that day. You think you can blend in here, try Chicago. It’s still a segregated city in some ways. Even with those problems, there’s plenty of neighborhoods where I feel safe, comfortable. Well, I did. Hasn’t been so much like home lately, but that’s temporary.”

“Most times, past, present, don’t seem to make much difference. The faces in town, they like to never change.” The burgers were disappearing fast; they came packed in small cardboard holders that, when empty, got stacked on top of each other on one side of the table. “Lately...feel like everything I do reminds me of growing up.”

“It’s trippy, thinking about what we were like as kids,” Maci said. “I got in trouble all the time. My grandma had me so figured out, I got in trouble if I even thought about doing anything. It’s like watching an old movie. You’re a different person, but the same, right?”

“That’s sort of what I been thinking about,” Glenn frowned. “You were talking that night about...being reborn? Living different lives? Do you believe that? We die and then start over as another person?”

She shrugged. “I wouldn’t say I take it literal. More metaphorical. You could think about every day in your life, or every week, year, whatever, every one is like starting over. You wake up in the morning, take whatever you learned the day before, and live a better life. Always trying to be better, that’s more how I see it.”

Glenn swabbed a pair of French fries around in a puddle of ketchup. “But do you...think it’s possible? You ever feel, maybe you were somebody else? Sometime in the past?”

“Can’t say I have. You’re getting into psychedelic territory, Glenn.”

“I keep dreaming about a kid...it’s hard to describe...he’s at a stable, working with horses but he’s too small for the work, and...” Glenn looked out the window. “I’ve never had dreams like this, where they’re so real. Not even dreams, really, cause I’m awake the whole time. It’s like it’s happening to me. Whatever happens to this kid feels like it’s happening to me. I’m not religious, but...” He grabbed his chest and bunched up his shirt in his fist. “It hurts. Like it happened to me before. You think it’s possible? And you talked about meditation and rebirth like they go together. Maybe meditation can help me figure it out. Maybe this kid and me...”

“I don’t know,” Maci leaned back from her food. “Did you hear what I said? Were you paying attention the other day? I can’t even go jogging on a public road without state troopers...law enforcement personnel? The guys who swore to protect the public?...I can’t even show up in public without getting harassed by some dumbass. You want to decipher some dreams? I’m not you magical Negro, Glenn. I was just trying to help you out, I’m not a Buddhist monk or something.”

She hadn’t raised her voice, but Glenn shut up while they finished their food.

Maci stepped into the restroom and Glenn threw away their trash and left the trays in a stack on the trash bins. When Maci came back, she indicated for Glenn to follow her; they stepped outside and walked the city sidewalks. Early workers driving home and school buses rumbled around them.

“I’m not really pissed at you,” she said. She put on her mirrored sunglasses. “Those troopers the other day really got to me. And I’m ready to go home. Honest, you’re all right, Glenn, but I’ve been away from home too long.”

“What you said before,” Glenn said. “About how easy it is for a few locals to get organized and for things to go really wrong. Wouldn’t have ever thought even a handful of people could get together in a town so small.”

“You haven’t seen what I’ve seen. But one person didn’t take the McCutcheons. So somebody’s more organized than you think.”

He nodded. A lot of things were turning out to be more than he’d thought.

“I told you before about the task force I was on,” Maci said while they walked. “The Bureau was in a supporting role. DEA, ATF, Chicago PD, everyone had a hand in it. There’s this agent in the Chicago office, white guy, maybe ten years older, so he’s senior to me. He’s been around a while and he’s got a lot of friends. He likes to mess with the Black agents. Not like there’s a lot of us.”

They were near a hospital and turned to follow the sidewalk around the complex of brick buildings.

“He always knows where to draw the line.” Maci held her hand out at a vertical angle. “He’s offensive but keeps his ass covered. Both of us were on the task force. This guy kept ragging on me. Making up bogus statistics about Blacks being drug users. I know the numbers. Most of the hype about drugs is just rich people worrying little Billy and Suzy are going to get hooked on crack. Crack’s bad out there, don’t get me wrong. Whole neighborhoods are getting torn up by it. But you haven’t seen it in Sommersville, have you?”

“Most of the drug activity we get is high school kids smoking pot. Empty glue tube now and then, but nothing to tie to a particular person.”

“The whole crack thing is bad, but nobody’s talking about why people are using it in the first place, or where it’s coming from. Reagan and his people keep sounding the alarm, trying to keep the public scared. Law enforcement agencies taking advantage, turned it into a money-printing operation. This Anti-Drug Abuse Act, Congress passed it last year, cranked up minimum sentencing, even for marijuana. Law enforcement agencies are getting militarized. Drug offense arrests are up over a hundred percent since 1980. You may not see more use, but you’re going to be under more pressure to look for users and get convictions on small-scale stuff. It’s coming, Glenn, you watch out.”

Maci sighed. They had passed the hospital and crossed the street toward a strip mall that ran the length of an entire block.

“Anyway, this racist agent wouldn’t shut up. One day I got fed up with his line and stood up to him. Not like I stood up to your state trooper friends. No kicks, right?” She cackled. “But I was in his face. Jabbed my finger in his chest.” She demonstrated on the air. “Told him to shut his trap and watch himself.”

She shook her head. “Stupid. You’re lucky you don’t have a temper. It always comes back to you.”

“What happened?”

“The task force ran a big raid on an apartment building. Run down place, a step away from the projects. Half a dozen residents were suspects. It was the middle of the night, we figured everyone would either be asleep or high. Whole thing went south. There was a rat on the task force. The suspects knew we were coming. That building was thick with low-level gang members and they had a damn arsenal. They knew how many of us were showing up, our approach configuration, everything. White boy got himself shot. Bad. They didn’t think he was going to make it for a while.”

They kept walking. Maci steered them across the strip mall parking lot and the traffic sound eased up.

“He pulled through. Problem is, my cousin in the building is one of the suspects. Like, a second cousin or some shit, I can count on one hand the number of times we’ve hung out.”

“Did you know?” Glenn asked. “You knew she was in the building?”

“I knew, but I forgot. Mistake number two, bad memory. I should’ve told the task force director. He would’ve taken me off the raid. Or sent me in with a wire to get evidence. It happens. No big deal.”

“They think you’re the rat?”

“Not really,” she said. “Nobody who’s serious, anyways. But the guy got shot, once he woke up, him and his buddies started raising holy hell. So...” She took in a deep, deep breath to calm herself and released it slowly. “My supervisor’s a good guy. He wants to be a good guy. He’s got to play ball with everyone, though. He figured if he got me out of town for a while, get me out of everyone’s faces, the situation would cool off. It’ll be easier for him to talk our boy down from escalating the matter.”

She pointed to the far end of the strip mall. A bright orange and yellow sign identified the store as Montgomery’s Music. Posters on the windows promoted mainstream acts like Bruce Springsteen and Bon Jovi, and some others Glenn had never heard of. “You want to check that out?” Maci asked. Glenn shrugged, too distracted by everything they had talked about.

“It’s been good for me to get away for a while. Take time to think. I’m feeling like maybe I’m at a transition point in my life. Maybe I should think about law school. Or even private investigation work. Something different.”

Maci lowered her voice as they pushed through the glass doors into the store. It didn’t matter because the store was playing a punk album at high volume. Maci scrunched her face and leaned closer and said, “Not my thing. Anyways, I’m enjoying our conversations, but I’m ready to go home. Sorry I blew up like that. Let’s talk more about that dream of yours when we’re out of this noise.”

Maci wandered off down rows of album displays, vinyl on one aisle and compact discs on another. Posters of rock stars lined the walls. Maci seemed at home but Glenn didn’t listen to music much and didn’t recognize a lot of the names. He browsed without looking. The next time he looked around, Maci stood at the register where a tall young man with what looked to be five or more earrings in each ear rang up her purchase.

“Ready to head back?” She grinned and shook the paper bag but didn’t tell him what she’d bought. They walked back to the White Castle parking lot and Maci drove them to Sommersville. In the car, she handed Glenn the bag from Montgomery Music.

“Go ahead, open it.” The day had grown hot and she adjusted the air conditioning.

Glenn pulled an audio cassette and portable cassette player out of the bag.

“I wasn’t sure if you had anything to play it on, so I got the player, too,” she said. “It’s just a few bucks, don’t sweat it.”

The cassette was called Push Push by an artist Glenn had never heard of, by the name of Herbie Mann. Glenn understood in an instant how different his life might have been if he’d had this to defend himself with twenty years ago. The cover retained its power despite the small size of the tape format; the man on the cover wore no shirt and held a flute in one hand balanced over his shoulder. The musician looked directly at the listener and expressed no care over what anyone else thought about him or his music. He was secure in himself in a way Glenn had never been. Mann didn’t look like a model, at least not models Glenn saw in advertisements, he even looked to be headed toward baldness. An ordinary guy who happened to be a bad-ass musician. Glenn didn’t need to hear the music to know it would comfort him and torment him for all the lives he could have lived.

“I wanted to give you a little inspiration,” she grinned behind her sunglasses. “Don’t be afraid to shake things up once in a while.”

“Thanks,” he stared at the gift. “That’s...I mean it, thank you.”

“I’m not familiar with him,” Maci said. “Looks like the kind of Joe Cool inspiration you could use. Listening to music was one thing me and my dad shared. We used to listen to this soul R&B radio station Chess Records started up in the early sixties. WVON. You know what VON stood for?”

Glenn shook his head.

She said, in a pretend DJ voice, “The Voice of the Negro.” She laughed. “Made more sense back then. The music wasn’t really his style, but he wanted to support what they were doing. They went all out supporting civil rights. Music, though, Dad was more into old school stuff like Coltrane, Miles Davis, all that. He about flipped when Miles got into his fusion albums. Me, I like the fusion stuff.

“All right, now, tell me about this dream you been having? I’m no expert on meditation, you understand? But I’ve met a few Buddhist monks, maybe I can get you on the right track about who to talk to.”

Glenn took some time getting warmed up, then laid out the images that had haunted his waking hours since the day the McCutcheons were reported missing. He talked about the boy getting the life kicked out of him and the horse stables that looked like 1800s Indiana and the well-intentioned but powerless sister and the hostile father whose face never appeared in the dreams.

“I don’t even know if dream is the right word,”he said. “I’m awake when it happens.”

He talked about the intensity of the visions, the feeling that he had lived through the pain first-hand. The loneliness he had experienced in his own life.

“I never believed in this past life stuff,” Glenn said. “Never even thought about it. This dream keeps eating at me and I don’t know what to do.”

They drove for a long while before Maci answered. “What if the dream just hit closer to home than other dreams you’ve had? Maybe this is how you really feel, or how you really felt as a child, and that’s why you can’t shake it? What about repressed memories?”

“No,” he said. He remembered every blow, every insult, every moment of fear over what might happen next. “I haven’t repressed anything.”

“Then it might just be the most honest dream you’ve ever had. You don’t have to tell me if that’s true. Just something to think about.”

He thought about it.

*****

THAT NIGHT Maci made a long phone call to her supervisor in Chicago, sitting on a chair in the kitchen. He didn’t realize how much their nightly talks had come to mean to him until he saw her real life pulling her back. Restless, he signaled he was going out. She frowned in a moment of confusion, recognizing he clearly didn’t have much of a night-life, then nodded and waved as he walked out the door. Cara stood with her head against the door for a moment, then went to Maci, who absent-mindedly scratched the floppy Lab ears.

Glenn listened to the radio as he drove the familiar route across SR 24 toward Brenda’s place. Talk radio hit on the hearings that looked as if they would last all summer.

Mr. Nields: You have testified that you assumed that the President had authorized the diversion. Lieutenant colonels in the Marine Corps do not divert millions of dollars from arms sales to Iran for the benefit of the Contras based on assumptions, do they? You had a basis for your assumption.

Mr. North: I had the approval of my superiors as I did for all other things that I did, Mr. Nields.

Mr. Nields: You had something else, didn’t you, sir? You had a specific reason for believing that the President had approved. You wrote memoranda, did you not, seeking the President’s approval for the diversion?

Mr. North: I did.

Mr. Nields: And indeed, you wrote more than one of them?

Mr. North: I did.

Mr. Nields: How many did you write?

Mr. North: Again, I will estimate there may have been as many as five...

Mr. Nields: And these five were written, I take it, on each occasion where there was a proposed sale of arms to the Iranians that you felt had reached a sufficiently final form to seek the President’s approval?

Mr. North: Yes.

He parked in his usual spot and turned off his engine and headlights. No red scarf on the door knob.

The sheriff’s squad car was parked in the driveway behind Brenda’s pickup.

Glenn first assumed there must be trouble but couldn’t think of a way to explain his presence. Thinking about it, he figured he would have been called for anything serious, and at any rate it was unusual for the sheriff to remain conscious this late in the day.

Before he decided what to do, the sheriff himself stepped out of Brenda’s trailer, followed by Brenda and little Sammy in his pajamas. The sheriff wore a button-down shirt and jeans and looked massive next to Brenda in her nurse’s scrubs. They looked like three apparitions under the fuzzy streetlight. Glenn couldn’t hear them but nothing about their conversation appeared strained. After a few minutes, the sheriff picked up Sammy, who disappeared into a hearty hug. He set Sammy down and Brenda stood on her toes for her own hug.

Glenn’s first reaction was irritation that he never interacted with Brenda’s son that way. Not that he especially wanted to, he understood how uncomfortable that would get as Sammy grew older and started asking questions about his father, who Brenda had never identified. Either way, he couldn’t help but feel put out that the sheriff got that kind of welcome.

Aside from the shock of seeing Sheriff Howard awake and sober at the end of the day, Glenn tried to avoid the larger question of why he was there in the first place. He didn’t picture someone of Howard’s age, or condition, experiencing the same frustrations he did. His visits to Brenda already caused him enough guilt, and seeing the sheriff there put a heavy weight on his shoulders, a fear that time would do nothing to calm him.

Brenda hoisted Sammy in her arms – he would be too old, soon, for her to hold him like that – and they waved as the sheriff drove off. Brenda put her son down and they returned inside. She put the red scarf on the door knob. Glenn waited long enough that no one would notice him and headed for home.

Maci had gone to bed. Cara wiggled around by way of greeting. He lay on the couch and turned on a late night movie, Missile to the Moon. The outlandish premise couldn’t distract him, a millionaire building his own personal moon rocket. Who would ever believe that? He turned off the TV with a huff. He sat on the sofa and tried to recall what Maci had told him. He closed his eyes and rested his palms on his knees. Took a breath and tried to focus on that. Every time he exhaled another hoof struck the boy’s face, or the lights went off in the cave, or the Old Man swing his fist, or Angie laughed at him.

The images never left his mind but the intensity faded. Something in his brain reminded him these were memories and he was still sitting in his den with the dog at his feet and if he could calm himself till tomorrow night, maybe a trip to Brenda’s would turn out better.

*****

CARA WAS FIRST on her feet when the phone rang before sunrise. Glenn stood too fast and nearly fell back on the sofa. He balanced himself with a hand against the wall and trudged into the kitchen.

It was Josh Avery. His voice caught as if he was crying.

“Glenn? It’s... You got to come over here, man.”

Maci had stepped into the hall in a tank-top and shorts, yawning and running a hand through her hair.

“What happened?” Glenn asked.

“The sheriff...” Josh went silent and a jostling sound came over the line. “He’s dead. The sheriff’s dead...”

“That supposed to be funny? I just saw the sheriff a few hours ago.”

“Looks like a...heart attack.” Josh coughed. “EMTs are here, but...he’s gone, man. What are we going to do?”

10

The only lights on in the building were Helen’s desk light and the desk light in the sheriff’s office. Helen sat at her desk and tried to pray but couldn’t stop sobbing long enough to finish. Maci tried to comfort her while Josh and Glenn talked. Josh’s eyes were red but he’d come around enough to be conversational. EMTs had taken the body to the county morgue in Concord to confirm cause of death. Glenn was grateful to have missed that.

“Sheriff came in around midnight,” Josh said. “I ‘bout fell out of my chair. Brought coffee from the Junction Mart. Said he couldn’t sleep and wanted to get some paperwork done. I stepped out for a call on a prowler. False alarm, just a cat knocked over some garbage cans. He was sitting at his desk when I left-” Josh choked. “Told me to be careful and all. I got back and...he was on the floor.”

Glenn took a slow walk through the station, head down. Had he seen a ghost the night before? The most unusual thing about seeing the sheriff outside the home of a part-time prostitute was how normal he’d looked.

“You said you saw him earlier?” Josh asked. “Did he look okay to you? Cause he looked fine when he came in.”

“No,” Glenn said. “I hadn’t woke up yet. My mistake.”

He looked at Maci for guidance but it wasn’t up to her to offer any. He kept thinking Howard must still be out there someplace and would show up in the office once it was light.

“Guess we’ll have to make funeral arrangements.” Glenn heard his voice but it sounded far off. Streetlights outside switched off as night gave up the ghost and their day of mourning began.

Helen, in the circle of lamplight, frowned through her tears. “His daughter will do it.” Her voice was a whisper in the dark room. “Poor thing. She’s going to need all our prayers.”

*****

FOR ONCE, the town cooperated. In the two days it took the coroner to confirm the cause of death (“It was his heart, but his liver wasn’t far behind.”) and Hall Funeral Home to prepare the body, the only calls that came in expressed sympathy and offered food and prayers. For two days, not a soul asked about the lost family. Glenn and Josh spent a lot of that time in silence and Maci offered assistance in any way she could. Helen made frequent trips to the church to pray and, when she was in the office, recalled anecdotes from her long work history with Howard.

“You should have seen him back then,” she told them one afternoon while they sipped coffee. Too mournful to bake her weekly coffee cakes, Helen had brought oatmeal cookies contributed by another congregant. “He was much more active. His...problem didn’t overtake him so early in the day. He carried more weight in his muscles.” One incident she recalled, “I reckon this was back in the late sixties,” involved a man who raised chickens on his property and complained about a neighbor family’s German shepherd taking his chickens at night. The chicken farmer swore he would lay traps for the dog if it didn’t stop. “Well, the family satisfied the sheriff the dog wasn’t doing any such thing, that old rascal just didn’t like dogs.” Late one night, the man sneaked a leg hold trap onto the neighbors’ property. The trap didn’t snag the dog but instead the couple’s seven-year-old son. “Sheriff personally drove that boy to the hospital and stayed with the family most of the next day. He stayed in touch with them for months, till the boy was back to walking normal. Then he went and put the fear of God into that chicken farmer.” The sheriff had opened the trap and told the man he could put his own leg inside or he could surrender with a full confession. “Sheriff hated those leg hold traps something fierce. They’re legal in Indiana, but they had a way of disappearing in this town.”

The pastor invited Glenn to speak at the service but they both knew the answer to that. The sheriff hadn’t ever talked about his religious views, if he’d had any, and Putnam interpreted that in God’s favor. “I don’t doubt the sheriff knew Matthew, chapter six, verse six,” the pastor said. “But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly.” Glenn didn’t understand what that had to do with all the out-loud praying Putnam did.

The church filled up early the morning of the service. Helen, Josh, Glenn, and Maci sat in the second pew together. As the crowd socialized before the service they remained respectfully quiet, but Glenn had heard all the gossip and knew the different opinions being thrown about: what a relief the sheriff’s personal demons couldn’t torment him any longer; about time Sommersville got some new blood in the sheriff’s office; maybe God should have called Glenn Haskell home first and spared Marvin Howard. He’d overheard hints of the tragedy in Howard’s past that sounded more like guesswork than genuine knowledge. The death invited the town to be more tolerant and less permissive at the same time. Either way, a change was gonna come.

When Brenda, in a black dress and looking more citified than Glenn remembered seeing her, with little Sammy at her side in a new suit, took their place in the front pew as the only surviving family, he understood another of his town’s widely known secrets.

Putnam delivered a eulogy of grand military scope. He compared the sheriff’s tireless battle against injustice, in a town with almost no crime, with the eternal struggle between the armies of light and dark. He described Howard’s vigilance in protecting Sommersville from the wicked. “From Psalm 144, Blessed be the Lord, my rock, who trains my hands for war, and my fingers for battle.” It was outlandish but Glenn’s anger was absorbed by his heart’s emptiness.

Most folks who attended drifted off, but a small caravan of cars followed the hearse to the cemetery, the place where Glenn’s mother was buried. Glenn drove the squad car with Helen in the passenger seat, Maci and Josh in the back.

“Glenn.” Josh caught his eye in the rear view mirror. “Something we haven’t talked about. What happens now? We need a sheriff, don’t we?”

Helen pulled from a box of tissues in her lap and blew her nose with a powerful honk. “The law says the deputy becomes the interim sheriff. Then the county schedules an election for six months out. That’ll be around Christmas, I don’t know how people will take to that. Maybe the county commissioners can put it off till January.”

Glenn squirmed in his seat. “Maybe moving it up before Thanksgiving’s a better idea,” he said.

They all looked at Glenn but arrival at the cemetery cut off any further talk. They gathered around a freshly dug plot under the shade of a vast white oak. Glenn recalled Maci’s observation about the age of trees and wondered how long after the sheriff’s death this tree would stand. Brenda and Sammy took their place next to Putnam, who, mindful of ties and jackets coming off in the summer heat, kept his remarks brief and less militant, reading Psalm 23 before consecrating one of God’s chosen to the soil.

Bodies in attendance were easier to tally out in the open. The Old Man was there, in the same leisure jacket he’d been wearing to funerals as long as Glenn could remember, balanced between Walt and Mitchell, Frieda alongside waving her arms as if her prayers could keep them upright.

“You keep losing people, boy,” the Old Man said as the crowd disbursed. “See if you can’t find somebody next time.” Frieda patted Glenn on the shoulder as they passed.

Randall and Angie were there. Randall gave a big smile and a wave from behind his sunglasses and sauntered back to his car. Angie approached them in a blue dress that looked like she’d purchased a couple of sizes ago.

“I’m real sorry, Glenn,” she said.

“Hey, Angie,” Glenn said.

She smirked. “You two sure do make a cute couple, though.”

“Yes’m,” Maci grinned and curtsied. “I’s likin’ my men-folk well-hung. You’s oughta try it, Missus.”

Angie scowled and kept moving. Glenn smiled for the first time in days.

“Too much?” Maci whispered.

“No comment,” he said.

“Not to sound catty, but she’s not aging well. Has she always smelled like cigarette smoke?”

He couldn’t answer. Angie’s smoking had always bothered him more than he’d let on, even to himself. No one in town ever questioned the eternal reign of high school nobility. It cheered him to see his old flame through an outsider’s eyes.

The small crowd drifted to their cars. Brenda, the pastor, and a few others talked quietly at the granite marker. Birds invisible to the eye hopped through the tree branches and whistled their summer songs. Glenn excused himself, intending to talk to Brenda. It took a moment to recognize the slender, balding man who intercepted him.

“Walter Joyce,” the free agent shook Glenn’s hand. “It’s all right, I didn’t expect you to remember at a time like this. My condolences. I never met the sheriff, but I hear he was a good man.”

“I’m a little surprised to see you,” Glenn said. “Figured you’d moved on a while ago.”

Joyce shrugged and steered them off in a private direction. He pointed out to SR 24, the fields around them, and the forest beyond that. “The American economy never stops. It could go off the rails if we don’t nurture it every chance. I just do my part and go where I’m needed.”

“What is it needs you here?” Glenn said. “If you don’t mind me asking?”

“I’m glad you asked. I told you, I rely on the local community. I can’t turn over every rock by myself. If anyone in the community has knowledge about a resource one of my companies might be in need of...like I told you before, I make sure everyone gets rewarded. Most of the businesses I’m connected with work with natural resources, coal and lumber and so forth. But I work for developers from time to time. You know the three biggest words in real estate: location, location, location. If a community has something rare, they owe it to themselves to exploit it as best they can and reap some profit. Especially a place like Sommersville, that’s been passed over all those other times.”

Glenn squinted into the midday sunlight. “Hard to imagine anything too special about our location. The canal, rail, and interstate all looked here and didn’t like what they saw.”

“You’d be surprised,” Joyce said. “All it takes is a little vision. You know Orlando, Florida, was basically done in as a tourist site by hurricanes in the 1920s. After that the U.S. military was the town’s biggest business. Then Walt Disney came along, saw the value of the location, and built himself an empire.” He raised his arm over his head. “The sky’s the limit, Deputy Haskell. Or should I say acting sheriff? Resorts, theme parks, casinos, caves, you name it.”

“Caves? Like Mammoth Cave, down in Kentucky?”

“Mammoth’s the jackpot, but Indiana has a whole slew of working caves. Squire Boone, Wyandotte, Marengo. Cave tours are good business when they’re done right. Tie them in with some historical event, or offer complementary activities, camping, fishing, you name it.”

Glenn looked at the ground and tried to imagine the lives put to rest under their feet. He wasn’t sure if Joyce wanted the location of the cave entrance, or was hinting for Glenn to get out of the way.

“I wish I was ten, twenty years younger,” Joyce said. “Like you. Powerful forces are coming together in this country. We got fiscal conservatives breaking down the welfare state. Communism’s on the run. The Christian community has come around to understanding the importance of a free market. You know Ronald Reagan is the first president this country’s had that’s been divorced? And it was the family values Moral Majority that elected him.” Joyce held his hands with fingers pointed straight up, then meshed them together. “All the pistons are firing. You look at this country twenty, thirty years down the line, it’s going to be a whole new ballgame. Some are going to make out like bandits. The average man, he’s got a choice to either sit on the sidelines, or play ball and live comfortable with his piece of the pie. You may think you’re far removed from the sources of power, but it’s a big pie, Deputy. There’s enough to go around.”

The play ball comment reminded Glenn of Pastor Putnam swinging his baseball bat.

“And the guy sits on the sidelines?” Glenn asked. “What’s he left with?”

“Same old same old. Now,” he leaned forward with a mournful look, “there’s always a cost to doing business. There are some that will not do well. At the extreme end...” He shook his head. “If one person gets killed by another, it’s a crime. That same person gets caught under the wheels of commerce, it’s what’s best for America.”

Glenn noticed the birds had gone quiet, as if Joyce’s very words had scared them silent.

“I appreciate the tips, Mr. Joyce,” Glenn said. “Like I told you last time, most of that’s over my head. I come across anything I think might interest you, I’ll let you know.”

Smooth as a magician, Joyce slipped a business card out of his pocket and slipped it onto Glenn’s palm. This had Joyce’s name and the same phone number as the previous card, but with the business name Harding Land Trust.

“I got a million of ‘em,” Joyce grinned. He turned serious and put a hand on Glenn’s shoulder. “I don’t want to talk your ear off over business on a day of mourning. You can call me any time, day or night. And I am truly sorry for your loss, and the town’s.”

With a wave, Joyce was gone, off toward his muddy Jeep parked at the cemetery’s periphery.

Glenn pocketed the card and walked back to stand next to Brenda and Sammy. Brenda had kneeled down to speak quietly to her son next to his grandfather’s grave. Sammy recognized Glenn and pointed at him.

“Did you know my grandpa?”

“I knew him a long time,” Glenn said. “Best sheriff a town could ask for.”

Brenda sent Sammy to wait with the funeral home employees who chatted at the front of the hearse.

“How did I not know you were his daughter?” Glenn asked.

Brenda’s smile was wistful. “I think you mostly had your mind on other things.”

“I’m awful sorry, Brenda.” Glenn couldn’t look at the name engraved in granite, a mark of heartbreaking permanence.

“He never did get over my mom dying,” she said. “That’s when his drinking started.”

“He never talked about it. Maybe it was...” Too much for him. Of course it was.

They stepped away to accommodate the work crew waiting to fill in the grave. Brenda led them past grave sites shaded by oaks and elm trees, areas where the grass was undisturbed and the dead were long settled.

“This was long before he ran for sheriff. I was still a little girl. He got an offer in Pittsburgh. You know, that’s like a huge city compared to this town. Seemed like a real opportunity to get his family out of here, someplace where we could all make something of ourselves.” She heaved out a deep sigh. “You know Sommersville, it never wants to let go of anyone. You imagine what people said to him when they found out we were moving? ‘You’ll never be happy in a city. People back east are different than us. Crime’s worse, drugs, all sorts of immorality. Blacks and immigrants.’ It was awful, Glenn, all the fear they tried to put in him. Told him he’d come crawling back before the year was up.”

Trees and gentle knolls in the landscape gave them the feel of being miles from anywhere, even though the main road was a short distance away.

“Damn if they weren’t right.”

“What happened?” he asked.

She hugged her arms to herself. “We barely made it over the Pennsylvania state line. A trucker fell asleep at the wheel. Drove us off the interstate. I woke up in a hospital in Pittsburgh. Dad was all bruised up and in a real emotional state. And Mom was-” She broke off and hunched up her shoulders.

Brenda went on once she’d caught her breath. “World was too much for us, just like everyone said. We came crawling back to Sommersville. He had her cremated and spread her ashes in the country, so she wouldn’t be stuck in this town like we were. He was so afraid to leave again, worried something might happen to me next time.” She raised a fist and hammered against an invisible surface. “It’s like a wall, keeping us all here. What do you think it’s taking me so long to save up to leave for? All I want to do is get Sammy out west and maybe things’ll be better for him. Get to where he can live without my fear being passed on to him. But what if it’s true and we’re really meant to be stuck here forever?”

Brenda hugged Glenn, not because he was especially comforting but because he came closer than anyone to understanding her loss. Drying her tears on his shoulder was the most intimate act they had shared.

They withdrew and Brenda tugged at her dress by way of collecting herself. She touched Glenn’s arm in a motherly gesture and Glenn knew that his night-time visits to Brenda were over, and he felt sad, but he also wondered if it was past time.

“What are you going to do?” he asked.

“Clean out his house and sell it,” she said. “He didn’t have a lot and the house won’t go for much. But it was paid for. It might be enough to get us started in California. I’m quitting my night work. The money’s good but it’ll put a burden on Sammy he shouldn’t have to carry. Maybe I’ll get a second nursing job. I swear, we’re getting out of here somehow. You should, too, you ever get the chance. The likes of you and me will never fit in here.”

He watched Brenda walk back to the hearse. He knew Helen, Maci, and Josh waited for him in the squad car, but he didn’t feel ready to leave. The workers had already replaced the soil at the sheriff’s grave. The lawn crew would fill in the sod when they made their weekly pass through the cemetery.

From behind a row of shrubs he heard a whistle that, if memory served, was a decent attempt at a blue jay call.

“Hey, Dennis.”

Dennis ducked out from behind the shrubs. “Howdy, partner.”

“You could’ve come to the service, if you wanted.”

Dennis shook his head. “Pastor Put-em-up wouldn’t have stood for it. I wanted to pay my respects. There’s a lot of people in this town never wanted me around. Sheriff stood up for me a fair number of times over the years. Hate to lose a good man like that.”

“You remember that cave we talked about, out near Emmett Crandall’s land?”

Glenn told his friend about the journey through the cave and, as best he could, described the location where they had exited.

“I’ll scout it out, get a better fix on where it is.” Dennis stroked his beard; looked out over the graves where every generation met its match. “What are you going to do, brother? You going to be sheriff? If it ain’t you, town’s going to bring in out-of-town blood.”

“Maybe they should.” He looked across the field at Maci, in conversation with Josh and a comforting hand on Helen’s shoulder. “Maybe it’s time some things changed here.”

*****

SOMEONE at Hopewell’s was kind enough to include some cow bones in a plastic bag for Cara in with the food they donated to the sheriff’s office. At home that night, Glenn gave one to the overjoyed Cara, and stored the rest in the refrigerator. The dog took the bone out on the back porch and chewed on it with complete focus. Maci and Glenn followed with their own snacks, various chips and cookies from Hopewell’s, and talked in the night air. Mosquitoes had begun to proliferate and the pair had to slap at an arm or leg from time to time.

The sheriff, in Glenn’s memory, had never visited the house. Maci and Cara brought more life into the place than it had ever known. But Howard’s absence from the world created an inescapable void. Maci tried to rouse him by talking about her own childhood and being raised by her grandparents.

“Dirt poor, but they stretched every dollar like it was the last one,” she said. “Anytime there was any kind of free cultural event, free museum days, you name it, they got me there. Came to all my high school softball games. Somehow they felt responsible for their son and daughter-in-law not working out their marriage, and they wanted to do better by me.”

“You feel at home there.” Glenn said. “In Chicago.”

“Yeah,” Maci said. “Most of the time. I do want to travel more. Get back to Belize. Maybe the Caribbean. I hit the Lake Michigan beaches now and then, but that Great Lakes water never feels warm enough for me, not even in summer.”

“You’ve got a place, though. Someplace you belong.”

She nodded.

“I never thought about how much I don’t feel at home here,” he said. “Not till lately. Never understood people were meant to feel at home, or what that even means. The sheriff’s passing, seeing all those people today. I don’t belong here. Maybe I never did.”

“Could be that’s what your dream is telling you,” Maci said. “Maybe it’s about this life. Your subconscious killing your old life and starting a new one. You know traits like fear and anger get passed down through generations? The Bureau has us reading all kinds of cool stuff. These scientists trained lab mice to feel fear every time they were exposed to a certain smell. The next two generations of those mice reacted to the same smell. I don’t get all the science behind it. Their DNA changed somehow. The later generations inherited this fear.” Maci sipped from a can of New Coke, also part of the Hopewell’s donations. She frowned and wiped her mouth. “No wonder they’re giving this stuff away. Anyways, what if this generational effect works on people? Maybe all the shit our parents and grandparents did got passed down. If fear’s holding you back...your dad didn’t do what he did to you out of courage.”

They didn’t notice the dog stop chewing and snap her head to attention. They did hear a loud pop and shattering glass from the garage. Cara bolted to the kitchen door that led to the garage. Maci was close behind, grabbing her service weapon from the bedroom in the time it took Glenn to stand and trip over the step into the kitchen. They paused at the door, struggling to hear over Cara’s growling. In a moment the dog relaxed her stance and whimpered to go into the garage.

Maci nodded and opened the door. Cara ran to broken glass from one of three small windows along the top of the garage door. Maci crouched low and approached the damaged window. She inched her head up to look outside. The dull yellow from the streetlight filtered across the street and surrounding yards. More than enough time had passed for anyone in a car or on foot to disappear around the next block.

“Nothing.” She nodded to Glenn and he flipped on the light switch. They sighted from the broken window to the opposite wall, the wall shared with the kitchen, and found a bullet hole in one of the exposed 2×4 wall studs. Maci looked at him. “Any ideas?”

Glenn looked from the damaged board to the gap in the garage door. “Never been shot at before. Not with real bullets, least ways.” The Old Man had been gone long enough for the house to become a place where Glenn could be alone, safe from real people if not their free-ranging demons.

“I know about every kid in town,” he said, his voice thick with nerves. “By sight if not their name. It’s no secret where I live. Can’t imagine it’s a prank.”

“We’ll pull the slug and get it analyzed. I’m guessing the gun it came from is serious business. No practical joke.”

Glenn leaned against the wall, gazing at the threat dug into the substance of the only home he had ever known. “Sheriff’s gone. Some folks might think they don’t need to hold back now.”

“If it’s not kids yanking your chain,” Maci said. “Even money says someone out there knows what happened to the McCutcheons. And something we’ve done makes them think we’re on the right track.”

11

Days later, the office still felt like a wake. Helen kept a rainbow bouquet of carnations in an old glass milk bottle on her desk. She had pinned sympathy cards to the lobby bulletin board, some personal from townsfolk and others formalities from fellow law enforcement operations. Since the sheriff’s death, Glenn had taken to bringing Cara to the office. Perhaps sensing Helen’s loneliness, the dog lay at the floor by her desk.

Maci and Glenn sat at the desk in his office, muddling through assorted paperwork from their day in Indianapolis, largely forgotten after the sheriff’s passing. The shooting put the fear of God into Glenn but reinvigorated both of them, convinced them they were onto something, even if they couldn’t spell out what it was.

“I don’t feel like we’ve learned much more than what the attorney told us,” Maci sighed.  “The land, most of it, I guess, was taken from the Miami by the state and sold to Daniel Fremont for a song. Fremont leaves town for Indianapolis, we think. Emmett Crandall comes along in the thirties and occupies some of the property. Claims he bought it, but it was really still held by Daniel Fremont’s estate.”

“And the state bought a piece of the land,” Glenn said. “Talking about a state park but they never did any improvements or opened it to the public.”

“What if an official line about public use was a cover story to justify the purchase?” Maci tapped a pencil against a paper-clipped bundle of legal-size documents. “We don’t know when that mine tunnel was dug into the cave. What if the state bought the land, expecting to turn it into a mining operation? And then...didn’t...for some reason. Then the question is, did they take it over knowing the cave was there, or not knowing?”

“But Crandall’s been treating it all like his own land.” Glenn bunched up his forehead. “Back then, he was pretty ornery about chasing off anyone trespassed. He always knew when someone was around, or seemed to, at any rate. You’d have thought it was his job.”

Maci straightened up and looked at Glenn. “Maybe it was.” She jabbed her pencil in the air to make her points. “Why would he live on Daniel Fremont’s land? I met Crandall once and even I can tell how stubborn he is. Wouldn’t he want his own spread?”

“They may have done business together,” Glenn said. “We saw that picture. All the old-timers seemed to know each other.”

“Nothing more dangerous than a room full of old white men.” Maci relaxed back into her chair, flipped another stack of papers with her fingers. “And then Fremont’s estate gets absorbed into this conglomerate. I feel like there’s a picture here, we just need a little more.”

“Wait a minute,” Glenn frowned. He opened a desk drawer and picked up the two business cards from Walter Joyce. “Coolidge Mining. Harding Land Trust. Any chance these are owned by the holding company?”

Both ruffled through assorted documents. “We’ve got to get better organized,” Maci said under her breath. “Oh, here,” she slid a photocopy across the desk. “Coolidge Mining. I don’t see Harding Land Trust, but they must be connected. Where’s the attorney’s phone number?”

Glenn pointed at a business card stapled to the front of a file folder. Maci dialed the desk phone and spoke with a silky, customer-service voice. “Hello, Mr. Joyce suggested I call you. Walter Joyce? Yes, that’s correct. We’re just looking for a contact with Harding Land Trust. He didn’t have the information handy at the time. They are one of your accounts, are they not?” She penciled a name and phone number on the blank side of a document. “I’m sure that will be fine. Thank you so much, have a wonderful day.”

She hung up and nodded. “Now we can connect Walter Joyce to Daniel Fremont’s estate, for what that’s worth.”

“And he’s interested in the cave,” Glenn said. He slumped back in his chair. “Even if we connect any of these people to the McCutcheons, what kind of motive would we have?”

The phone out front rang. They heard Helen’s voice for a moment, then the call transferred to Glenn’s desk.

It was the historian, Jeffrey Slocum.

*****

GLENN HAD BEEN inside the Empire State Bed & Breakfast many times over the years, but never when Lillie Oberlin was absent. In spite of knowing she now resided at an assisted-living facility in Indianapolis, he had a hard time shaking the feeling that, like the McCutcheons, she had departed the world. Slocum had arrived first and invited them into the dining room. He worked with a clipboard and had set up cardboard boxes on the floor in each room.

“Miss Oberlin doesn’t have any family, I guess you know that,” he said. His habit of looking at the floor was even more pronounced in this setting where he clearly felt like an interloper. “She asked me to oversee her estate. A lawyer’s figuring out the paperwork. Anything I consider appropriate will go to the museum. An auctioneer will be by next week to evaluate everything else. She’s still talking about the boarding house as a site for a museum. She thinks it will work out.” He fussed with his glasses. “It’s a little awkward. I know I’m a newcomer here. I don’t want people getting angry at me, especially those that thought of buying this property after she was gone. Since we met before, I thought I should start out talking with you. I approached the sheriff a while back, but...well, sorry again about his passing. Seemed like a great guy.”

“Anything the sheriff’s office can do to help?” Glenn asked.

“Communities get resentful, sometimes, if their local history doesn’t stick to a familiar narrative,” Slocum said. “I’m from around here but I’m young, and I’m willing to talk about how marginalized people have been treated in Indiana over the years.” He couldn’t help glancing at Maci. “Minorities. The Miami. You can see what’s happening with Ryan White and his family. Some people don’t want to hear that kind of talk. People don’t always cling to tradition because it’s good. Sometimes they cling to it because the alternative forces them to admit they were wrong.”

“Give us a call, anyone ever gives you any trouble.” It’s what the sheriff would have said. From Glenn, the words didn’t inspire the same follow-through ability.

“Oh, there’s this, too. It’s the real reason I called you.” He turned in his chair and leaned over three cardboard boxes on the floor, all open and sized to hold file folders. “Miss Oberlin kept a diary. For years. Decades.” He pulled three leather-bound notebooks from one box and lay them on the table. “Not just as a kid. Well into her adult years.” He looked toward his feet. “You were asking about the history of this area. She saw a lot of what happened the last sixty or seventy years. She gave permission to read them. She’s not coming back, she said any gossip is fair game now.”

Maci caressed the faded leather of the diaries. “You don’t want these? Must be a great artifact of the times.”

Slocum clenched his jaw. “I know what they say,” he said. “It’s the rest of you that need to know.” He lowered his head. “Sorry. Read the diaries. You’ll understand. I trust you to return them when you’re finished.”

“There’s a lot here,” Maci said. “Any certain place you suggest we start?”

Slocum returned the notebooks in the box. “You could about pick any time. People always find reasons to be cruel.”

Maci, Glenn, and Slocum each carried a box out to the car. The scattered pedestrians on Main Street watched

“It’s a dumb question, but...” Glenn said. “You ever know of any horse ranch operated here? In the old days?”

“No place specific I know of,” Slocum said. “Horses were everywhere in the nineteenth century. The horse ferry operated a long time, so there must have been someplace in town to care for them.”

“Even in a town this small?” Glenn set his box on the ground and opened the trunk.

“Oh, yeah. Horses were used in transportation, farming. They worked the canals and railroads. That’s one of the reasons those systems were so important, they simplified overland travel by horse. Mail delivery. Even by the early 1900s, there was in the neighborhood of twenty-seven million horses in the country. All these streets,” he pointed down the length of Main Street, “served horses long before cars came along. The whole industrial development of the country might not have happened without horses.”

They placed the boxes in the car trunk.

“You could say horse breeding was tied in with the eugenics movement in the late 1800s, early 1900s,” Slocum said. “There were horse breeding associations, this whole idea that there were superior family lines of horses. Traits like intelligence and grace and strength got passed down genetically, so did inferior traits. Breeders thought they could purify the species by mating superior families and weeding out inferior ones. Others came along and did the same with people. Or tried to. The Nazis took that argument and ran with it.”

“The Klan, too,” Maci said.

“Them, too.” Slocum lowered his head. “I always wondered what happened to all those horses once they weren’t needed. I guess most of them died natural deaths. But the horse population declined fast. More Industrial Age cast-offs.”

“I never spent any time around horses,” Glenn said. “You know if they ever get violent at all? Hurt people, that kind of thing?”

“Not sure about that,” Maci said. Her face flushed with shyness. “Don’t all little girls love horses? My grandma probably had a different horse drawing for every day of the year to put on her refrigerator. For a while there I had this fantasy of owning horses when I grew up. By third grade I was connected enough to the city, I forgot about the whole horse ranch thing.

“But violent?” she held a hand to her forehead to shade her eyes. “Hardly ever. They form up in pecking orders, social hierarchy is big. They accept humans as their leaders, but it’s got to be someone who has some confidence and pays attention. Show them who’s boss. Horses trust good riders, but the insecure ones... Horses won’t get aggressive, not openly attacking people, but if they get riled up, they could do some damage.”

“So kids could handle them?” Glenn asked.

“Yeah,” Maci tilted her head and looked at him over imaginary glass frames. “You thinking about your...?”

“Yeah.”

“They’d need training,” she said. “Kids would need to be old enough to have some confidence. A really young kid with no experience...bad idea.”

“I read that oxen were easier to manage,” Slocum said. “Never been around them myself. They’re stronger, slower, a little more docile. They did a lot of the grunt work on farms, especially where people couldn’t afford horses.” He tapped the car trunk and gave a half-wave to the contents. “Let me know what you think.”

*****

MACI AND GLENN picked up their traditional dinner at Hopewell’s. Leaving, Glenn gave a mournful look in the direction of the sheriff’s office. “No one to give an update to,” he said. They took the food and diaries to the house and sat outside. Cara sprawled out on the concrete with a cow bone from the fridge while they read Lillie Oberlin’s thoughts from years ago. The diaries were numerous and out of order; the amount of yellowing of the paper and cracks in the leather covers suggested their relative age.

“Look at this,” Maci held one of the diaries like a sacred relic. “She’s writing about the Korean War here. The Korean War, Glenn. Think of the history she’d seen by then, and we weren’t even born when the Korean War started.” She ran a finger along the page and read, “Just this morning, I was appreciating the English lavender and day lilies blooming in the garden, only to hear on the radio that President Truman is committing us entirely to war in South Korea. Our young men are going off to fight again. I don’t pretend to understand the necessity of it, but I am not even forty years of age, and I am well tired of war. Can you believe this?”

“Here’s one a lot earlier,” Glenn said. “1925. She must have been awful young then.” He paused scanning through the pages. “It’s about the horse ferry. Out at the bridge, where Dennis lives.” He told Maci what little he knew, not much more than the fact that the ferry business existed. “The old stable-” He cleared his throat and handed off the diary. “You got a better reading voice than me.”

Maci took the diary with a chuckle and commenced reading. “Mother says the old stable is being sold for farmland. The car bridge replaced the ferry several years ago. The ferry operators tried to hang on but finally gave up, and they don’t need the horses any more.” She looked up. “This girl was a lot better writer than I was at that age. Father took me once to watch the horses but a mean man yelled at us and we left. The stable looked messy up close. Father said the people who live there are very poor. Sometimes I can see the horses from across the river. I love to watch them and I’ll miss them very much. I begged father to get one of them for me. There are lots of places where we could keep a horse. I even cried when he said no. He says it’s not practical. I don’t know what that means. What could be more practical than having a horse? I asked him what would happen to the horses, but he said he doesn’t know.”

Glenn leaned back in his chair. Maci folded the diary closed with one hand marking the page.

“That correspond with your dream?” Maci asked.

He nodded. “It was alongside a river. In the dream.” Cara had tired of exercising her jaw and stood by Glenn while he scratched the top of her head.

Maci opened the diary. “Father says that happens sometimes. The world changes and people who did one thing aren’t needed anymore. I don’t know why he said people because I asked him about horses. He said I would understand when I get older.”

They scanned the books, balanced between a curiosity to linger over the history and a hope to find information related to their case. Lillie Oberlin wrote about the Great Depression and the New Deal, the Ku Klux Klan, and the local farming and business community, and as she grew into adulthood her thoughts reflected a weariness with the repetitions of history. They found entries from the 1940s.

“They knew about the cave.” Maci looked up from the diary she read. “It’s right here. Oh my God, listen to this. This is...March, 1942. Boarding house business continues to be slow. A few soldiers stop on the way to their bases. Mostly on their way to Indianapolis or Chicago. Some just ask for food and conversation. Others stay the night. Mother never charges them and always sees they receive hospitality. The town already seems quieter because of how many local boys are signing up. Of course, I don’t have a husband or beau to say goodbye to, but a lot of tears are being shed by the girls who do. Most of the talk is about Europe but it sounds like a lot of the boys are going to the Pacific or Africa.

“That doesn’t leave me with much to do but I’m trying to learn as much as I can during the slow period about operating the business. It’s hard to focus on that with the war going on. They’re saying German U-Boats are on the east coast. A tanker was sunk at the mouth of the Mississippi River. They’re in the St. Lawrence River in Canada. If the Nazis are that close, what’s to keep them from reaching the Midwest through the Great Lakes? The whole town is frightened but the men are trying to be reassuring. Some people know of a cave outside of town. The exact location seems vague but the general feeling is that this might be a safe shelter if the Nazis make their way inland. I was in Hopewell’s recently and Mrs. Hopewell says that some who participated in the Underground Railroad used the cave as a hiding place. Escaping Negroes could take refuge there during the day and continue their journey at night. I read that fugitive slave laws made it dangerous for escaped Negroes to remain in Indiana, so many of them kept going to Canada. Father says he knew of the cave’s existence but believes the entrance was sealed. Mr. Crandall and some others are looking for it. If they find it they’re planning to fill it with non-perishable food and other supplies. I gather once it’s found, the location will only be shared with a few to avoid a panic. As much as I’ve missed having a child, with the world so uncertain maybe that is for the best.”

“Crandall knew about it.” Glenn frowned. “He’s known it all this time. Why would they seal the entrance? Who would have done that?”

“We don’t know when the mining tunnel was dug,” Maci said. “Could have been closed for safety reasons. Keep nosy kids out.”

They sat quietly, picking at the food, listening to crickets and watching the fireflies.

After a time, Maci asked, “You’re still thinking about the stable?”

He nodded. “Never been one to dream much when I sleep. Sure never had trouble keeping dreams and life separate. This one... It just feels like I really lived through it.”

“Horses are powerful symbols, it’s almost like they’re part of our nature. They’re big in Chinese mythology. Two monks on white horses brought Buddhist scriptures to China and translated them into the Chinese language. They show up a lot in Hindu mythology. You heard what Slocum said, about how important they were to industrial development. I wonder if it’s one of those things that just gets ingrained in our DNA? Like me wanting a horse as a little girl. Just like Lillie Oberlin.”

“It’s in all of us, you mean?” he asked. “It’s bigger than me?”

“Kind of the opposite,” Maci grinned. “We all contain multitudes. Your dream might be about your life, or some past life. Or it could represent something fundamental to human existence. Fear of mortality, or authority. Feeling trapped. Don’t tell me you don’t feel trapped here, Glenn.”

She leaned back and made a lifting-up gesture with her hands. “You know horses evolved here? In North America? Then they migrated to the Old World. The ones left here died off, they were extinct in this continent. Then the Europeans brought horses back. They were gone, but their roots were in the soil from the beginning. The Plains Indians saw horses as a status symbol. All that talk about freedom, pursuit of happiness...watch a group of horses running over a field and tell me that’s not where that talk came from.”

That didn’t get rid of the fear the dream caused him.

*****

THE NEXT DAY it rained off and on from sunup to sunset. They left the back sliding door open; Cara stood at the doorway from time to time and fidgeted before finally dashing into the yard to relieve herself and run back inside. During a break of sunshine Glenn finally called out a repairman to patch up the broken garage window that had been covered with cardboard since the shooting. The repairman, Sam, was a heavyset good-old-boy in baggy jeans that showed too much when he leaned over. Glenn had met him a few years back when he’d fixed some siding damaged by a falling tree branch. He blinked when he saw what looked like a Black woman and white man in cohabitation but looked at his work order again and shrugged when he realized he’d met the FBI agent everyone in town was gossiping about.

“Sorry about that,” he said. “Didn’t pay attention to the name.”

Maci went with Glenn to respond to a handful of calls but none of them amounted to anything. Having a federal agent over his shoulder may have helped in a couple of instances. They browsed through more of Lillie Oberlin’s diaries but found nothing as revelatory as the entries they had read the day before. Maci reported in to her supervisor; the smoke was clearing in Chicago and she would be able to return soon, but she felt they were close to some kind of breakthrough in the McCutcheon case. “Sometimes you just have to spend enough time thinking about something,” she said. “Figuring out which pieces fit together.”

Over dinner – including baked potatoes with all the trimmings – they watched The Blob on the Indianapolis station. Glenn remembered seeing it on TV as a kid. The manifestation of a town’s troubles into a physical object that never stopped growing hit a little too close to home.

“They’re all just waiting for me to declare the McCutcheons dead,” he said. “What have we really got? A man who died years ago owned some land. We got lost in a cave.”

“And we can’t prove our lights were taken,” Maci said. “It’s our word against the boogeyman.” She looked at the boxes of diaries set against the well. “Still a lot of those we haven’t read.”

The rain had let up and the dog wandered into the yard. Darkness came on earlier because of the lingering cloud cover.

“We don’t even have a theory,” Glenn complained. “Were they kidnapped? Killed? Not even close to having a motive.”

“Or a viable suspect,” she said.

“I keep thinking about this Joyce, the contractor. No doubt he’s out of place here.” Glenn leaned over the coffee table and picked at some green beans but had lost his appetite. “I don’t see there’s anything to prove.”

They watched the end of the movie and when it looked like the characters were hauling away the creature with a helicopter, that big question mark that came on the screen at the end felt like a personal insult. Over the drone of TV commercials, Glenn looked around the room.

“Seems like the dog’s been out a long time.”

In only a few weeks, the dog’s frequent attention had come to seem normal. They stood in unison and stepped through the open sliding door. Glenn whistled for Cara. The air was heavy with humidity and the tree branches dripped leftover rain. A far away owl hooted its nocturnal presence.

Maci tapped Glenn’s shoulder and pointed. They ran to the black shape at the far end of the fenced-in yard. The grass was slick and patches of bare earth had become clinging mud.

Glenn cried out, though he wouldn’t remember it later. The dog was unconscious and her tongue hung out the side of her mouth. Her torso heaved with deep, unsteady breaths. Glenn put his arms under the dog and picked her up. The limp body felt heavier without the buoyancy of her playful attitude. Maci ran ahead and opened the gate at the side of the house. She kept going and opened the rear passenger door on the cruiser. Glenn, mud dripping from his arms and shirt now, placed the dog on the seat and went to the driver’s side. Maci sat in back and held on to Cara.

“Emergency vet’s in Concord,” Glenn said as he backed out of the driveway. He only knew that because of an incident Helen described several years back of one of her cats eating some Christmas ornaments. He flipped on the lights and siren and drove like the wind.

Maci spoke comforting words to the dog. Cara’s breathing faltered several times but quickly resumed. The only traffic they passed was a few big rigs going to or from local deliveries. As the lights on SR 24 flashed over their faces, Glenn’s fear evolved into anger.

The animal clinic was a small brick building at the intersection of a street leading into Concord. Two cars were in the parking lot when they screeched to a halt by the door. Maci hopped out and opened the clinic door, calling to the one staff member at the counter inside. Glenn carried Cara in. The rest passed in a blur. The vet’s assistant directed Glenn to an exam room where he placed the dog on a metal table in a small, tiled room that smelled of antiseptic. The vet, a portly man with a black-and-gray beard, fired away with questions mostly answered by Maci. Mud on Glenn’s arms, from the yard, smeared over his face when he wiped away tears and looked at the dog’s lifeless face.

The doctor shooed them into the waiting room with plastic chairs, about two years’ worth of National Geographic magazines, and a TV on a nightly news broadcast with the sound turned low. Glenn stepped into a small washroom to clean himself up. He slouched in a chair. Maci touched his arm and was sympathetic enough, smart enough, to avoid empty promises or clichés. The news turned, as it always seemed to these days, to the hearings in Washington.

Mr. Liman: Did you have a conversation with Director Casey where he said that the Contras would not be alive without Colonel North?

Mr. Poindexter: Yes. I almost said that, but I figured you were going to ask that as the next question.

Mr. Liman: And you shared that view?

Mr. Poindexter: Yes, I did. I certainly did.

Mr. Liman: And I understand from your earlier testimony that you did not go into this degree of detail in briefing the President, is that so?

Mr. Poindexter: I certainly did not brief the President in detail of all of Colonel North’s activities. That would have been much too great a level of detail to cover with all of the other arms control and United States/Soviet issues that we were constantly struggling with. But I do think that the President understood that Colonel North was instrumental in keeping the Contras supported without maybe understanding the details of exactly what he was doing.

Maci herself hadn’t noticed she’d picked up one of the diaries on their way out. “Habit,” she said. “Always trying to be prepared.” She thumbed through the pages and raised her eyebrows in question.

“Yeah,” he said. “Distraction might do me good.”

“This is from 1928,” Maci said. “September.” She cleared her throat before reading and even that echoed in the morgue-like silence of the waiting room. “Those poor Miami are being tormented again. Their expanded family living arrangements seems to offend the purists. I don’t understand how they’re hurting anyone. Their children seem perfectly healthy, the few I’ve seen, at any rate. But social workers have taken some of the Miami children from the area. Their situation is labeled unsuitable, a term that is too vague to argue against effectively. No one, officially, knows where the children were sent. Rumors – even here, that’s all I can say, what if someone gets hold of my diary? – say the children have been sent to Chicago or other places for adoption, or to orphanages. My own people call the Miami savages but what could be more savage than taking children from good families?”

Lillie Oberlin had written more about the Miami in the early 1930s. “Father practices sport hunting now and then, not so much for the enjoyment but for what he calls camaraderie among men of similar status. He says the state started requiring hunters to be licensed in the last year of the 1800s, not long after his family first settled here. I listen to our boarding house guests and I listen to people about town and I read the newspaper and it seems the Miami Indians who live in the area were not required to have hunting permits. It took me a bit of time to understand the meaning of the word subsidence, but living off the land, independently of the restrictions the rest of us live by, seems to be what the Miami were allowed to do back then. Who are we to ‘allow’ them to live the way they always did? They have so little to begin with, and never bother anyone. One day...I pray Mother never learns of this, I would be in awful trouble...Barbara and I went off with-”

Maci flipped forward and backward a couple of pages. “She’s mentioned Barbara before, that was her close friend from school, right?” She continued reading, “Barbara and I went off with Francis, one of the Miami girls. She invited us to visit her family’s farm. We felt sorry for Francis, because her family is so poor and people in town make fun of her. But her family was so nice to us and their home didn’t seem poor at all. Oh, it’s much more rustic than I’m used to, but everything was very clean. They live in a collection of farmhouses they built themselves. It’s an entire extended family, so many I couldn’t keep track of all their names. And such a variety of food! All manner of things I’d never eaten before. They seem to be able to find food everywhere, but they said it’s because of the river and everything that’s able to live around it. They had wild strawberries, and dandelion greens, and corn and squash they grew themselves. They had delicious syrup they made from maple sugar they collect every spring. And they hunt a little bit of everything. Beaver, fox, rabbit, porcupine, ducks and geese, fish. I know Mother would never allow some of these things served at the inn, but Francis’ mother gave me some delightful preparation tips. They seem to find a use for nearly every scrap of the plants and animals they gather.

“I don’t understand why a few fish or rabbits would cause such an uproar. The problem now is game wardens are no longer allowing the Miami to hunt without permits. They’re arresting Miami and those long-suffering Indians don’t understand. I saw two of them brought in to the sheriff’s office, just mystified and frightened. All anyone tells them is that everything they do is somehow wrong. Father says they have to learn to ‘join the fold,’ that everyone has to yield to civilization. I’m not sure I care for all of civilization’s demands.”

They didn’t watch the clock but the TV had advanced to the Carson show by the time the vet came out.

“You got here in the nick of time,” he said. “I think she’ll make a full recovery. Any longer and...I don’t know.”

Maci put a hand on Glenn’s shoulder and they both let out heavy sighs. He looked at his hands and saw they were shaking.

“Definitely some kind of toxin,” the vet said. “It’ll be tough to figure out exactly what. Did she have access to any fertilizer, weed killer, that kind of thing?”

“Nothing like that,” Glenn said. “Can’t remember ever having that stuff on hand.”

“Any angry neighbors?” the vet asked. “You’re a sheriff’s deputy? There must be a few people out there holding a grudge. It happens.”

Maci and Glenn traded looks, both thinking about the gunshot through the garage window.

The vet gave them care instructions and a few cans of soft food to smooth out the dog’s recovery. Glenn and the vet’s assistant carried Cara out on a stretcher and placed her gently in the back seat. The black face turned up sad eyes and licked Glenn’s hand as he moved to close the door. Glenn drove them home on auto-pilot while Maci sat in back to secure the dog on the seat. At the house, Glenn carried Cara inside and placed her on her blankets on the living room floor.

They hadn’t bothered locking up the house earlier; Maci walked the perimeter of the property and inspected the backyard with a pocket flashlight. She ducked her head in the sliding glass door and gestured for Glenn to follow. She led him across the backyard to the section of fence near where they’d found the dog. The narrow beam of the flashlight picked up two boot prints in a spot of mud outside the fence.

“Those don’t match my shoes,” Maci said. “What about yours?”

He lifted his shoes to be certain; shook his head. “We weren’t ever out there, anyway.”

Maci tilted her head in a gesture of uncertainty. “We need to check the photos. I’m pretty sure that matches one of the prints outside the cave. Fits a pattern with the garage window.”

Glenn looked into the darkness. The owl’s rhythmic hooting sounded again, from farther away this time. “We’re on to something. Can’t figure out what it is.”

“If it’s a message, it’s a clumsy one. Someone brave but not too smart. We’d probably have given up by now if they hadn’t shot the window out. Somebody’s trying to scare us away from something we weren’t even sure existed.”

“Yeah...” A drizzle had started and Glenn wiped the moisture off his face. They walked back to the house. “Probably a lot of folks in these parts fit that description.”

They had about reached the sliding door when they both stopped and looked at each other in a meteor flash of revelation.

“Not too smart,” Maci grinned.

Glenn nodded. “They sure think they got the run of the place, though. Makes sense if there’s trouble, they’d be mixed up in it.”

“You want to confront them directly?” Maci asked. They stepped in the door and Glenn stooped down to pet the sleeping dog. “It’s your town. Could get messy.”

“I got an idea about someone I can talk to.” Glenn clenched his jaw at the helpless animal. “Didn’t realize I’d got so attached to this dog.”

“It happens. Pets sneak up on you.”

“They should have left her alone,” Glenn said. “Like you said, some secrets are already known by everybody else. The people we need to talk to are right here in town.”

*****

JACKIE’S LAUNDROMAT was on Harrison Street – named after President Benjamin Harrison, who was born in Ohio but didn’t get into politics until after he moved to Indianapolis – around the corner from the main business area on Main Street. Jackie had been a kind-hearted woman who looked the other way when the washer and drier were out at the Haskells and Glenn’s mother tried to freeload on the tail end of other peoples’ drying cycles. Last he’d heard, Jackie lived in a little farmhouse outside of town and left the laundromat operation to others.

Glenn parked the cruiser on the curb opposite Jackie’s. The windows were rolled down. Maci, wearing sunglasses in the passenger seat, looked across the street at Angie folding clothes on a table inside the laundromat.

“There she is,” she said. “You were right.”

“I sort of kept up with her schedule for a while.” Glenn fidgeted in embarrassment. “Their lives haven’t changed that much since then.”

“You sure you want me to sit this one out?” she asked.

“She won’t have her guard up if it’s just me. She figures I never amounted to much.”

“Yeah, well, the sheriff knew otherwise. I’m on his side.”

Glenn nodded his thanks, stepped out and strode across to the laundromat. Every step on the asphalt restored his anger. A cigarette hung from Angie’s lips and she hummed a tune as she scrubbed mud off a pair of child’s sneakers over the laundromat’s industrial-size sink.

Angie gave him a lazy smile when he walked in. “Oh, hey, Glenn.” She held up the shoes. “That boy of mine loves to play in the mud. See what you’re missing by not having kids?”

Glenn kept his sunglasses on. “Lot of rain yesterday.”

“Sure was.” She had already half tuned him out. On reflex she chuckled, “You here on a big case? I guess you only ever had one big case, ain’t that right?”

A pair of men’s boots, covered in their own clumps of dried mud, lay on a work bench next to the sink. “Those Randall’s?” Glenn asked.

“Mm hmm.” Angie dropped her cigarette butt in an ashtray by the sink. Ever since Maci’s comment at the funeral, he’d become more aware of how much his old flame stunk to high heaven of cigarette smoke. “My two boys.”

When she turned, he could see the bruise over her right eye.

“You run into a door?” he asked. “Trip and fall?”

“Oh, you know,” she laughed it off but her voice caught. “Randall gets temperamental now and then.” She even figured out how to turn that into an insult. “Don’t all men?”

He’d always been taller than her but this was the first time he stood over her with conviction.

“All that time I thought I wasn’t good enough,” he said. “I had things all backwards. All your talk about getting out of this hick town. You are this hick town. You’re a sickness, you and everyone like you that don’t know anything better than trying to drag down other people. All you ever had was talk. It’s all you’ll ever have. My fault for thinking you could hurt me with that.”

He was out the door and across the street before she could devise a comeback.

“Looked like it got a little heated in there,” Maci said. “You okay?”

Glenn nodded. “The boot prints are the same.” He gripped the steering wheel. “It was Randall. Son of a bitch.”

12

Maci had to catch up on Bureau paperwork so Glenn went to the hardware section at Hopewell’s to buy new flashlights. A little time alone wouldn’t hurt; he hadn’t fully calmed down from seeing Angie at the laundromat. He searched for the most powerful lights they had in stock. Even if he never got up the nerve to go back in that cave, the office needed good lights on hand. Hopewell’s was oriented more around hunting than pleasure camping, but their light selection still looked promising.

“Looking for camping supplies?” Like a spirit, Pastor John Putnam had approached in total silence.

“Pastor, good to see you.” Glenn didn’t consider it “good” in the least, but his job required a fair share of false pleasantries. He had crouched down to gather flashlights off the bottom shelf and had to tilt his head back to speak with the pastor.

“Any leads on the McCutcheons? It’s been so long, I worry people are losing hope.”

Glenn never understood how men of the cloth spent so much time expecting results from others when they had the Almighty on their sides.

“Following up every lead,” Glenn said. “You know how it is. Small town, you’d think we’d find plenty of folks know something. Nobody admits to knowing anything.”

“We’re having prayer vigils every weekend,” Putnam said. “I keep hoping you’ll join us. People are getting restless, Glenn. A whole family’s gone missing and you don’t seem to be making any progress. The McCutcheons have been members of the church their whole lives. There’s talk of reaching out to the state police.”

“Is that right? Who’s doing the talking?”

“Maybe you could use some help. Find people more experienced with these matters. Of course, you’ve got this FBI woman, the two of you seem to be spending a lot of time with each other. What exactly is she doing here, again?”

“Not spreading gossip, far as I can tell.” Glenn dropped his merchandise and stood up in the pastor’s face. He didn’t lose his temper often so people tended to pay attention when he did. “You’ve got that covered. Or is she being Black? Is that what you’re worried she’s doing here?”

“I’m just reminding you that God hasn’t forgotten you.” Putnam was a proud, strong man with a congregation behind him, but the congregation wasn’t around at the moment. “And this town hasn’t forgotten God.”

“Then how come God hasn’t told us what he did with that family?” Glenn stepped forward and Putnam had nothing to do but back up. “You want to talk about God forgetting? Where was God when my old man was beating me half to death?”

“Now, Glenn, things happen to us as children, and we blow them out of proportion over the years.” Putnam backed against a shelf. Customers were watching, and listening, but none of them looked inclined to intervene. “God’s path is mysterious to us sometimes...”

“You church people come up with a lot of excuses for little kids to get beat up.” Glenn turned, picked up the basket of supplies, and walked off. “Mysterious ain’t the word for that.”

The clerk at the register waved Glenn past, putting the goods on the sheriff’s office account. Shoving his way out the door, Glenn realized no one was going to call the Indiana State Police or anyone else. The people of Sommersville could be relied on to expect the outside world to come to them, all the while refusing to seek out that world, all the better to keep their dirty laundry hidden.

*****

THAT NIGHT Maci insisted they skip the Hopewell’s deli and bought some genuine groceries. “I’m no great cook,” she said. “But all this red meat and potato salad’s not doing our hearts any good.” She picked up a few things in the grocery section of Hopewell’s and scrounged up what she could in Glenn’s kitchen. Most of the cooking utensils and dishes were left behind from Glenn’s parents and of questionable quality even when first purchased. “I’ll make it work,” she said when she shushed Glenn out of the kitchen. Cara hovered under Maci’s feet the entire time, on the lookout for scraps unique to her experience. “Bet you never got this at the other place, did you?” Maci asked the dog.

They ate a proper meal at the kitchen table; chicken, pasta, and sauteed broccoli. Glenn, having experienced only his mother’s limited cooking abilities in that kitchen, stacked his plate with seconds and relished every bite. “Now I get why people like home-cooked food so much,” he said.

“So. We’ve got a suspect,” Maci said. “Do we have a motive? Do we really think Trooper Randall is a criminal mastermind who kidnapped a family of three?”

“Even if he could pull it off,” Glenn said. “Even with Dittmer and Williams’ help. Why would he? No motive is right.”

After dinner they sat outside under the porch light and mulled over the problem while reading more of Lillie Oberlin’s diaries. Familiar names in the town’s history appeared along with her interpretations of larger events. Through the 1920s and 1930s, the young woman’s views of the world began to mature in a way that diverged from those of her parents and formal schooling.

The word eugenics appeared in the Oberlin diaries in the late 1920s, among her thoughts on the rise and fall of the Ku Klux Klan over the course of the decade. “The newspaper says ten percent of Indiana’s population is part of the Klan. I imagine it’s higher than that in Sommersville. The governor and, I think, a number of mayors around the state, are utterly loyal to the Klan. Father is a member but...it’s hard to be sure, but I get the impression he doesn’t always agree with them.

“There are dreadful rumors about and I honestly don’t know what to make of them. Mother and I were at the hair salon in Concord and some of the women were talking. There is speculation that Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris has become an armory of guns and explosives to support a Catholic takeover of our state. I don’t understand how a church all the way in Paris relates to our state but they even say the Pope plans to move the Vatican here. Here, in Indiana! They say a large band of Klansmen stopped the Monon Rail just last month because they believed the Pope himself might be on it! I guess that ended up as an awkward moment when there was only a lone salesman on the train.”

Maci shook her head. “Conspiracy crackpots. Figures a bunch of small-town bumpkins would get it in their heads they’re so important the whole world’s scheming how to take over the place.” She looked at Glenn. “Nothing personal. It’s everywhere. The smaller some people are, the hungrier they get to feel important.”

Lillie Oberlin wrote – haltingly because of her young age – about the Klan’s fall from power in Indiana in the mid-twenties, when the Grand Wizard for the state raped (“attacked” was the word Miss Oberlin used) a woman the night of the inaugural ball of the newly elected governor. The governor wouldn’t have been elected without the Klan’s support, but he failed to offer a pardon when the Grand Wizard was convicted. Instead, the Grand Wizard started naming names and before long a whole series of politicians were up on bribery and conspiracy charges. The governor finished his term in disgrace and the Indiana Klan turned into a sinking ship that thousands of people couldn’t jump off fast enough.

“However, I’m beginning to understand a comment Father made,” Maci read from a journal entry dated March, 1934, following a gap of nearly eight months. “I remember it clearly. It was several years ago, we were sitting at the dining table. He said he agreed with some of the Klan’s positions, but he feared that their more extreme positions, those he opposed, had seeped into the culture, so that even after the Klan fell from power, maybe some of that darkness would remain forever. Now, I wonder, has the darkness overcome my own family, or am I going mad?”

Maci paused and they looked at each other, both considering the earlier conversation about the wrong people getting organized. They knew the outcome of Miss Oberlin’s life, her status as an eccentric town elder, but they didn’t know the path that brought her there.

“I know some people always looked down on me because of my deformity,” the journal continued. “I understand I might never receive a proposal of marriage as a result. A simple genetic flaw – that’s what the doctors called it, at any rate – made my left leg an inch shorter than my right leg. I’ve always walked with a limp but I never understood how noticeable it was. I point this out because I have spent these recent months considering this. I’ve prayed, also. It’s what everyone told me to do – my parents, the surgeon, the hospital chaplain, our pastor. Only silence answered my prayers. But my thoughts, the only company I’ve had on some of these recent, lonely days, have assembled what I believe is the truth. And that is the reason for my long absence from my journal.

“I already knew something of the rise of eugenics in modern times. We read Erskine Caldwell’s The Bastard at school and the younger classes have read his Tobacco Road more recently. I well remember President Hoover’s radio address, in 1930 I believe it was, when he spoke of ‘physical and mental ideals’ and claimed that more than twenty percent of American children are inflicted with some sort of physical or mental deficiency. He seemed to be blaming the country’s problems on this rather than the Depression. Of course, I understood that I was one of those young people, but our family has always enjoyed a certain privilege. I suppose I thought that would more than make up for a minor impairment. And it is such a slight limp!

“Not so slight, I suppose.

“I believe it’s the only explanation for what they did to me. It started as abdominal pains that became so severe I could hardly stand. The doctor diagnosed acute appendicitis and entered me into the hospital straight away. Apparently, while I was under anesthetic, our family physician, the surgeon, and my parents decided to perform an additional procedure. From the few details they shared with me and revisiting what I can recall of the eugenics movement, I’ve pieced together the situation as best I can.

“The Depression has got everyone looking more closely at imperfections of any kind. There is all manner of fear that America’s national prestige is declining. The newspapers are filled with the escapades of organized crime. Politicians say that Christian America is being overrun by impure immigrants. Physical fitness levels and business productivity have all declined. Magazines are urging us to be more physically active. The national birthrate has also declined. Mental illness has become more widespread and the costs of housing these people is considerable. And of course we still follow news from New York, and an International Congress of Eugenics was held there only two years ago. I suppose I was vaguely aware of these things from listening to Father and his fellow businessmen when they visit, from browsing the newspapers, and from things we’re told in school. It all seemed to me to be exaggerated, rhetoric used to stir up the masses. Father basically said as much while reading the newspaper at breakfast one morning.

“Still, as Father said about the Klan, an insidiousness has become normalized and with time we all fall under its spell. The one thing everyone growing up learns is that Sommersville needs to attract more investment from business or government. The Depression and the eugenics movement are feeding on the town’s insecurity and any idol will be bowed to, any talisman will be revered if it attracts the blessings of business and government.

“Desperation is the only reason I can deduce for what they did to me. I pray my parents would never have done such a thing if they weren’t under the scrutiny of a desperate town.

“Of course, my prayers were not answered. Not when I cried myself to sleep in the hospital bed after I woke up. Not in the days since as I’ve tried to understand.

“Mother reminded me that by now I’m likely never to have gotten married, even without the limp, now being nearly twenty years of age.”

Maci arched her eyebrows and looked up. “Nearly twenty in 1934? And they were dissing her for not being married? That means she was born in...1915? 1916? That’s no spring chicken, but after spending time with her, I kind of thought she was ten or fifteen years older.”

“Guess I did, too,” Glenn said.

“Either way, it should have been my decision.” Maci tapped the page with an index finger. “That part’s underlined.” Then, “Preventing unwanted births is more important than ever, is what the doctor told me. He said it was crucial that my birth defect not be passed on. He said it would affect my family’s standing in the community. He said these sorts of things define how we appear to the rest of the world. The state would never build a major road through Sommersville if the town is filled with defectives. He used that ugly word. To describe me. Defective.”

Maci closed her eyes and lingered over a deep sigh.

“I’ve known about strange things happening to others. I tried to pretend it was just my imagination, or that maybe they were really bad people without my realizing it. Some of the Miami have been forced to leave, but others just disappeared. Francis told us about a hunting party of four men from her extended family who never returned, and no bodies were ever found. Children have gone missing; some to orphanages or asylums, but others are unaccounted for. For several years there have been rumors about some Negroes who settled outside of town and then abandoned their home; some people claiming Negroes are inherently unreliable say this happens all the time. Maybe it does, but I don’t believe that’s the reason.”

Maci looked at Glenn. “Even back then, people around here were vanishing.”

“Got me thinking about those hippies that disappeared,” Glenn said. “From the newspaper. Back in my old man’s day.”

She nodded, eyes lost in space for a few seconds before she took up the journal again. “Now that I’ve been through what I have, I understand all those people are gone for the same reason. The powerful people in town – my own family included – haven’t exactly been secretive about this. I simply wasn’t able to put it all together until I was sterilized against my will.”

A long silence stretched out between them. Like a reluctant student, Glenn asked, “Does she mean...?”

“Yeah,” Maci snapped. “They spayed her like a stray dog.”

She gave him a look of apology and of sympathy at his inability to ever fully understand the weight of the event.

“I suppose I should consider myself fortunate. I still have a home and a family. I didn’t get sent away to an asylum or convent. Or worse. But everyone looks different now. Church is different. God didn’t answer my prayers and He didn’t keep me from being put on the wrong side of this invisible line that separates the saved from the damned. Even though I’m still here, I know my parents will always see me as the one they wanted to cast out.

“Will all this social engineering get Sommersville what it wants? Will it put us on the map of prosperity? The same line that separates people must also separate towns. Will my sacrifice put us on the good side? Will anyone’s?”

They sat in silence and watched the fireflies. Cara had long since grown weary and lay sleeping at their feet. The two humans were too troubled by Lillie Oberlin’s experience to face the solitude of sleep.

“I wonder if that’s why she looks older,” Maci ventured. “After what they did to her.”

Glenn wanted to protest but couldn’t find solid ground. “I never heard of this...eugenics?”

“I only know the bare minimum. I know it’s where the Nazis got their ideas. They didn’t come up with that racial purity stuff on their own. From what Miss Oberlin’s saying, it sounds like different people carried it out in different ways. Kill some. Hide others in institutions. Try to prevent the unwanted from having babies.”

“I wonder how much of this the sheriff knew about?”

“He was the sheriff long enough,” Maci said. “And spent a good amount of time with Miss Oberlin. I know he was your friend, but he had a sickness. Could be these ghosts are what drove him to the bottle.”

“Or kept him there, least ways.” Glenn hadn’t told her the fate of Howard’s wife. Thinking about the children Lillie Oberlin never had led him again to the boy in his dream and how that kid was bound to die in a world where the runt of the litter never got the time of day. “Makes me wonder if I’d lived back then. Would I have passed muster with these people?”

“Damn sure I wouldn’t have. Think how many people my color ended up swinging from a tree. Not like back then was so long ago. People are dropping like flies from AIDS and who’s blinking an eye over it? Just this year HHS added HIV to the list of communicable diseases so they could block immigrants from entering the country. There’s a mindset that says, Be first to label someone else the other before someone puts the label on you.”

Glenn held up his hand, index finger raised in a wait here gesture, and went in the house. He returned with the black-and-white photo of Daniel Fremont, Crandall, Glenn’s grandfather, and the two unidentified men. He centered it on the table so they could both see.

“Miz Oberlin didn’t know these things happened,” he said. “Beyond what they did to her. But if she was right, these are the guys that did know.”

“Be nice if we could identify the other two.”

He bit his lower lip, thinking. Then nodded and stood up. “You think the McCutcheons might have known?”

*****

THE TIME was near midnight and the streets were dead silent. Glenn drove them to the McCutcheons’ house. Cara, in the back seat, tilted her head in confusion when they pulled in the drive.

The house, uninhabited for weeks, smelled musty. They turned on overhead lights in the living room and kitchen. “Any neighbors watching already saw us pull in,” Glenn said. “Nothing to be secretive about now.”

Cara sniffed around the house that was familiar but, somehow, foreign to her now. Glenn had fixed the interior of the house in his mind and looked around at what had changed. A few lamps were gone. The assortment of birds on the maple hutch had mostly vanished. A chair was missing from a back room.

“I told them to stay out of here,” he grumbled.

“Vultures are closing in?” Maci asked.

“That pastor and his people won’t wait for anything. They’re in too big a hurry to declare the family dead and claim the property for themselves.”

Glenn shook off the emotion and showed Maci the photos on the breakfast table in the kitchen. The pictures he’d noticed, then forgot about, the first day he was there.

“Never looked at them before,” he said. He pulled the picture from his closet out of his pocket.

They spread out the photographs on the table and leaned with their elbows against the wood surface. No rhyme or reason they could see to the McCutcheons’ photos. Most appeared recent. Haunting reminders of the flesh and blood family that had slipped from the town’s grasp. The son smiled up from a bicycle with training wheels. Bill McCutcheon posed with a fishing pole in front of the boat. Missy laughed while the dog, a blur, jumped around her. Glenn looked at Cara, sitting hesitantly in the kitchen doorway, uncertain once again about the steadiness of home and dependent on others to settle the matter.

“There.” Maci jabbed an index finger at one of the pictures, a black-and-white with similar discoloration as the one Glenn had brought. The McCutcheons’ photo was of three men. Two were clearly Daniel Fremont and Emmett Crandall. The third was young, tall and lean with a disorderly mop of hair. Maci moved her finger back and forth between this photo and one of the men in Glenn’s. “Same guy?”

“Sure is.”

Maci picked up the photo. Two more photos of a similar age were paper-clipped behind it. She removed the others and flipped over the first photo. Grandpa, Uncle Emmett, and Mr. Fremont was written in pencil at the top. She lay the other two snapshots on the table. In one, Daniel Fremont and the man identified as “Grandpa” stood on a plot of land. They were turned at an angle, looking away from the camera toward a small complex of plain wood-frame buildings, houses and small barns, all encompassed by a split-rail fence. Fremont pointed at the buildings, his arm blurred in the unposed image, and appeared to be explaining something to the younger man.

“It’s just a guess,” Maci said, “but that looks like the Miami homestead Lillie Oberlin described. Looks to me like the colonists are getting ready to take over.”

In the final shot, the young man, all alone, kneeled on the ground and held a handful of stone arrowheads to the camera. The artifacts were grainy and in shades of gray, but Glenn had seen enough of them to imagine the different colors and texture of the chipped stone. The only hint to the location was a heavy wood beam behind him.

“Look familiar?” Maci’s finger traced the vertical beam.

Glenn pressed his lips together in a half-frown. “Sort of.”

“Looks like the entrance to the mining tunnel. That guy’s been in the same cave we were in.”

The experimental mine shaft entrance must have been new, or freshly reframed. Even the time-worn photo showed solid, freshly tarred wood, not the waterlogged remnants Maci and Glenn had found.

“Billy McCutcheon went to see Crandall,” Glenn said. “Before they went missing. He was looking for old family photos.”

“What kind of people are the McCutcheons?” Maci asked. “Smart? Dumb? Social? Loners?”

“I didn’t know them well.” Glenn shrugged and pointed at the family’s handful of memories on display. “Average family, I reckon. Not a lot of Ivy League people coming out of Sommersville, so I’d say they’re average if you’re going by local standards.”

“Bigots?”

“Huh?”

“Are. They. Bigots.”

“Not that I ever knew of. Not the robe-wearing kind. You’ve seen the town. Not a lot of-” He started to say colored, the term that would have been polite conversation for the Old Man. “Not a lot of African Americans around to draw out that kind of behavior. Some of that stuff don’t show itself day-to-day.”

Maci straightened and took measured paces around the kitchen. “We keep coming back to that land. The Miami. Underground railroad, if you can believe what Miss Oberlin was told. Daniel Fremont. Your own grandfather. Crandall and his niece's family. The kids trying to set up a commune in your old man’s time. Your state trooper friend. Our lights didn’t walk off on their own when we were in that cave. People have a way of disappearing around here, and we could have-” She turned back to the photographs. “We could have joined them. What’s the secret that everyone knows? The thing that’s stayed alive all these years?”

Glenn stared down his grandfather’s face in black-and-white, a man he’d scarcely known. He tried to deduce the man’s thoughts and emotions in the moment the photo was taken, tried to imagine what he had known in that instant, and projected that like a wave through time and space onto all the others who must have shared that knowledge and the burdens it had created. He remembered the Old Man’s short fuse when asked about the past. He remembered falling into a corner of his bedroom one morning, no more than six or seven years old, the Old Man kicking him, a cup of coffee in one hand and a cigarette in the other, and his mother sticking her head in the door, looking at them, and moving on like nothing had happened. And he remembered a night, years later, when Dennis encouraged him to take that secret as his own.

“Maybe it’s not one secret,” he said. “Maybe it’s all the secrets. All the terrible things people in this town have done and handed down to the rest of us. Like you said, passing it on, like it’s in their genes. Maybe it’s time we shook the tree a little harder.”

*****

BY THE TIME they got back to the house it was coming up on two in the morning. Glenn lay in his bed, exhausted but too mentally wound up to sleep. He closed his eyes and tried the breathing technique. His mind went over and over whether he would be able to say what he needed to tomorrow – today, really – but the breath work calmed him and he decided he only had to get out one sentence. Tell me everything. All he had to do was say that and stick to it.

He slept later than usual. By the time he got up, Maci was already up, coffee in the pot, and doing yoga on the back porch.

*****

THE YOUNG RECEPTIONIST at Sunrise Manor was just settling into her desk when Glenn walked in at the start of visiting hours. He’d debated asking Maci to go with him, but couldn’t be sure he wouldn’t sink down to childhood and lose his nerve and he didn’t want her to see him like that. His fear in the cave had been humiliating enough.

The receptionist greeted him and looked at the wall clock. “He’s most likely still finishing up breakfast,” she said.

Glenn strode through the lobby without stopping. “I’ll find him.”

The Old Man was in the cafeteria with Frieda and Walt. Frieda set in talking about it being a nice surprise to see him at such an early hour, but Walt picked up on Glenn’s expression.

“If it ain’t Barney Fife.” The Old Man didn’t even look up. Coffee dripped from his chin until he soaked it up with a bite of toast. “I think the kitchen’s out of doughnuts, but you go ask if you want to.”

“We need to talk.”

“Yeah, sure.” He stabbed his fork into a fried egg yolk. “Pull up a chair. Where’s that pretty colored friend of yours?”

Glenn figured he’d better act before his anger ran out of steam. He kicked at the Old Man’s chair leg hard enough to turn him sideways. “In private.”

People at the nearby tables heard the noise and lost their voices.

“What’s got you all-”

He leaned over the Old Man. “I’m not asking. You’re coming with me. Now.”

The Old Man peeked up at his son, finally beginning to register fear at a tone he’d never heard from Glenn. He stood and hobbled toward the exit, wiping his hands on his pants. They held their tongues down the dark hallway. Glenn shoved the door to the back courtyard open for the Old Man to walk through; his foot caught on the door frame and he stumbled against the side of a concrete planter with scraggly roses. No one else was in sight.

In spite of tripping, the Old Man had his confidence back. “What the sam hell’s the matter with you?”

Glenn stood over him and jabbed a finger into his chest. “You start by telling me about that cave out near old man Crandall’s place. Tell me what my grandfather had to do with it. Him and Daniel Fremont and Missy McCutcheon’s grandfather and what looks to be a whole mess of other people, too.”

“What are you talking about? I never heard such foolishness. That FBI woman’s putting a lot of ideas your head, that’s-” He turned away but Glenn shifted to stay in his face.

“You damn well do know what I’m talking about. Is Crandall the caretaker? Was that his job? That’s why he scared us kids off that land all those years?”

The split-second pause told Glenn he was onto something. The Old Man turned away again and tried to keep up his bluster. “Boy, you’re crazy. Your mother didn’t have no sense, neither.”

Glenn jabbed a quick punch into the Old Man’s lower back. Samuel grunted, his face twisted, and he braced against the concrete as he dropped to his knees. Glenn squatted and looked into the Old Man’s face, bright red now with tears on his cheeks.

“You drove me to crying enough times. How’s it feel?”

“Chrissakes, that’s what you come to now? You gonna beat up on an old man?”

“Is that worse than beating up on a helpless kid?” Glenn pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and tossed it on the sidewalk in front of Samuel. The Old Man wiped his face; tried to replace the fear with anger but couldn’t muster it.

“Crandall bought that land in the thirties. Did he buy it, or did Fremont buy it for him?”

“I don’t know nothing about money. You think I’d be here if I did?”

“You know enough,” Glenn said. “Don’t keep playing dumb with me. Who paid for it?”

“I was barely even alive in those years, how the hell do I know who paid for what?” The Old Man turned himself, gritting his teeth all the way, to sit proper and lean his back against the wall. He looked at his palms, scraped from the fall. “Could have been Fremont. Crandall sure never could have put the money together, even in those days. Not for that much land.”

“He owned all of it back then? Before the state came in? Why him? Was he good friends with Fremont?”

The Old Man tried to laugh and it came out as a sputter. Glenn had put more force into the punch than he’d meant to. “None of us was friends. This town ain’t about friends. Never was. Fremont, Crandall. It was all of us. Half the damn town knew what all happened, and the other half could’ve guessed if they’d have give it a thought.”

“Why Crandall then?”

“Why not Crandall? Could a been anyone. One thing, though, Crandall was the only one seemed to enjoy it. By the time I was grown and knew him, I could see that much. He always did have a hateful streak in him. Fremont had left town by then, but he kept his hands on things. Him, Matt Oberlin, my old man, while he was around.”

“And Missy McCutcheon’s grandpa?”

“Yeah, him, too. I said, most everyone knew what went on. Not like Fremont or anyone else had to say anything. It’s just how things got done.”

“What things?” Glenn asked. “What happened exactly?”

Samuel sputtered again. “You don’t know? What, you think somebody robbed a bank and hid the loot in the woods or something?”

“The Miami owned that land, didn’t they? All of it? The town took it from them and drove them off. Crandall was the lookout, what was he looking for?”

The Old Man beat one hand against the other while he talked, like it all should have been plain as day. “Where do you think those Miami went? Some of them give up peaceful and moved on. There was some wanted to put up a fight. Keep what was rightful theirs. Couldn’t rightly blame them.”

Glenn thought for a minute. He didn’t like the direction the story was going but figured he didn’t have much choice but to keep on.

“So? Where’d they go?”

The Old Man worked his jaw a bit. He pointed out to the world. “In that cave. Where do you think the town’s been dumping its scraps as long as it’s been a town?”

Glenn felt dizzy and sat next to his father. He closed his eyes and rubbed his temples. He wanted to take that image out of his mind but couldn’t imagine he’d ever be able to.

“They just- They killed them? Was it the Klan?”

“Names don’t matter, boy, don’t you understand? It’s just how things get done in this country. Could’ve been any number of people had a hand in it. Before that it was someone else. And someone else again after. They wore Klan robes for a spell, but it’s the town. It’s the people. That’s all it ever was.”

“And put the bodies in the cave? Thinking no one would find them there?”

“Find them?” Samuel wiped his face with the handkerchief again. “Who’d ever care enough to look? Blacks, Indians, Mexicans, cripples, you name it. The only danger was who might stumble on it accidental. That’s what Crandall was supposed to look out for.”

Glenn needed a minute to process that. “More-” He inhaled and tried again. “You saying more people got buried in there? How many are there?”

“I don’t know. Fair odds any death nobody wanted to answer any questions about, there’s a body in that cave.”

Glenn tried to do a mental tally of bodies and realized he didn’t even know where to begin. How many lost souls could one town possess?

“People knew about the cave from back in the Underground Railroad days?”

“Underground railroad.” The Old Man snorted. “Any runaway slaves wanted to keep running didn’t come anywhere near Sommersville. It was long before my time, but you can bet, any that did like to never come out. Real underground railroad was houses of abolitionists. Cellars, attics. I was told there was some around Concord. People guiding coloreds into that cave weren’t no abolitionists. Was people couldn’t stand the thought of slaves running off and being free somewhere else. Hell of a bait and switch that must’ve been.”

Glenn sighed. “So Crandall’s job was keeping people away? After they took the land from the Miamis?”

“Was his job. Not like a paying job, but it was understood he was to do it. Damn old fool’s gotten senile. You found that cave, no telling who else might.”

“It’s not on his land. It’s on the state side of the line.”

The Old Man said nothing. Glenn shifted to look at him.

“Something else happened?

Samuel kept studying his bloodied hands.

“State bought the land in the fifties, right?” Glenn asked. “That was your time. You must have known something about it. Those hippies were trying to start a commune or something and the state bought out the land.”

The Old Man looked sideways at Glenn. “You know about them?”

“Oh, God.” Glenn put a hand over his eyes. “Them, too? Is that... Did you do it?” When the Old Man didn’t answer Glenn gave him a powerful shove. “Was it you killed those kids?” Glenn grabbed the Old Man’s shoulder. “Was it?”

“Not me! Not...no, I helped get ‘em out there. Ain’t that hard. Get back into that cave, it like to go on for miles. Drag anyone back there far enough, the cave’ll do the rest. Turn someone loose in that cave, no lights, they’d like to never find their way out. Some miracle, somebody was able to drag their selves out of there, you can bet they’d never be right in the head again.” Glenn barely felt right in the head after his own cave experience.

“Wasn’t no murder. Not direct, anyways. Just like...” the Old Man waved his hands, “...throwing ‘em down a hole. Good luck climbing out.”

Glenn recalled Maci dragging him through that underground stream and knew he’d have died there himself if not for her. How many people had crawled through those tunnels until they took their last breath, praying for light and never finding it?

“Why? All they wanted to do was build some cabins and raise some cows, who was going to get hurt by that?”

“It was the land.” Samuel spit out the words. “Don’t you get it? Once bodies got buried out there, that cave had to stay hid. That’s why the state bought it. Some rich folks connected with Fremont worked it out, they had contacts in the state government. Besides, what company’s going to set up stakes here with some damn commune down the road? That’s all it was ever about. Trying to get business to come in. Big state contracts. Townfolk would’ve filled the cave in with sand if they’d have thought it would make a difference. Anything to get the town on the map and make money doing it. Fremont, Oberlin, all of them, the ones that have money, they’re always looking for ways to get more money.” His voice was getting hoarse. His face was red and streaked with tears. “Only reason Lillie Oberlin lived through childhood was ‘cause her family had money. And those that don’t have, help them do it ‘cause we figure we’ll get the scraps. Maybe enough scraps to build something on and turn into one of them.”

“That’s why? You went along with...whatever all this was, just for scraps?”

“Dammit, what do you think paid for the down payment on that house you’re living in?”

“Fat lot of good that did. Jesus, Dad. So you figured that made it okay to blow what little we had on beer and cigarettes? That made up for taking a life?”

“You didn’t see what I saw, boy! You didn’t grow up watching people just-” He snapped his fingers. “Just up and go away with no warning and never knowing if you was going to be next. Knowing you’re never going to be one of the lucky ones so, what else you got? Just go along cause there ain’t no other choice.”

That last part sounded exactly like how Glenn had grown up. A thought came over him and he shivered. “That’s not what happened to mom’s parents? Didn’t they move away, like you always said?”

“No, not them.” Samuel coughed. “They figured they’d seen enough. Instead of waiting for the world to find us, they went out into it. Some of the few that was smart enough to never come back.”

“But somebody? Somebody in the family? That’s what’s kept you quiet all this time?”

The Old Man looked about to explode at working over all this history he thought he had outrun. Finally some of the tension left. He leaned his head back. “My brother.”

“I never knew you to have a brother.”

Samuel beat his fist against the sidewalk and immediately regretted it. “Course not, you damn fool! Cause his body’s out there with all them others!”

A light came on that showed Glenn his father in a way he’d never seen him. “You had a brother and they... What for?”

“God damn polio, that’s what for. He was crippled from polio. Happened in thirty-four, the Depression going on, our family couldn’t have ever afforded to take care of no cripple. And even if they could, people running this town would have done anything to make things look perfect and try to get jobs brought in, WPA, CCC, anything. Like one kid in a wheelchair was going to make any difference. We didn’t know no better back then. It was just easier for the people with power to sweep all they could under the rug. Don’t throw a bunch of money away-” His voice caught and his eyes turned all weepy. “Bunch of money away on those that aren’t going to amount to nothing anyway. One day he was there and the next he was gone. They just took him away and me trying to sleep in that room alone every night wondering where he’d gone to and if he was ever coming back and if I was going to do something wrong so they’d take me next. What was I supposed to do?” He wiped at his eyes and nose. “What was I supposed to do? What was I supposed to do?”

Glenn gave the Old Man silence until he’d cried out the worst of it.

“Every summer was polio season. Like damn Russian roulette and every kid had a gun to their head. Never knew one day to the next which kids were going to die or wake up crippled. Got even worse by the early fifties,” Samuel said. “Just dumb luck, them early vaccines coming around not long after you was born.”

“How’d the McCutcheons get into this?” Glenn asked. “All this...whatever...it’s not still going on. I’d know if people was disappearing like that. Now the McCutcheons go missing? What did they do?”

“Damn if I know. It’s her granddad was helping out Fremont and them. Don’t know if she ever knew anything about it.”

“And Randall? The state trooper? What’s he doing sniffing around out in that woods?”

“Randall? That young fool that played football in high school?” The Old Man scoffed. “Got the brainpower of a dead cat. I don’t know nothing about him. Nobody in this town talks to me any more, boy. I tell you what, though. It’s been years since this town had leaders like Fremont or Oberlin. Who’s it got now, that pastor that thinks he’s God’s special angel? Anything like the old days going on out there, even money says it’s someone out of town.”

“Didn’t any of you think someone would figure it out? Find the cave? What if some kids had come on it?”

“They closed the damn thing! Thought they did, anyways. Mining company must have dug that shaft way back, 1800s maybe. Come on to the cave by accident. They didn’t find no coal, but it opened a big old garbage dump for the town. They was supposed to have sealed the entrance up years ago, not long after...well, after those hippie kids went missing. Another thing that fool Crandall should have kept his eye on. Them hippies might have been dumb pot-smokers, but they was white and a couple of them was said to come from rich families. Between hiding the entrance and the state blowing smoke, threw off any questions.”

“So, it was Fremont, Oberlin, Crandall, you, maybe the McCutcheon grandfather,” Glenn said. “Who else? Over all that time, there must have been more.”

The Old Man banged his fist against his leg this time. “You still don’t get it, boy. It was everyone. And it was no one. Wasn’t some organized thing, giving orders and killing people and whatnot. Wasn’t nobody planned this stuff. It was people thinking the same way and then their kids thinking the same. There’s always another company talking about setting up a factory here. Another state road project going to bring traffic through. Whole town, always thinking, Now we’re going to make some money. Clean up the ugly spots so’s they don’t show. Didn’t matter how much they already had. Top, middle, bottom. People talk about selling their souls, like it’s a one-time thing. We went right on selling ours over and over. Ones at the top, they was going to make out, no matter what. That’s why Fremont and those like him never stayed on. They squeezed out all they could. Was the rest of us stayed and paid the dues.”

Samuel patted his side, as close as he could reach to his injured back. “You remember when I fell off the roof that time. Bum back kept me up a lot of nights.”

Glenn remembered. “You were in a lot of pain?”

“Booze covered that up. No, I was-” He cleared his throat but it didn’t strengthen his voice. “Scared. Scared it made me like one of them that got taken away. Hadn’t anyone gone missing in years by then. Still... Couldn’t go anyplace without feeling like people were looking at me. Adding up how long I was worth keeping around. Day didn’t go by, I didn’t think about my brother and what they done to him. Always afraid I’d be next.”

No wonder the Old Man refused a cane. Glenn couldn’t count how many times he’d wondered all these years how he could have turned out so different from his Old Man. Now it seemed like he wasn’t so different, after all.

“Don’t do like me, boy. Don’t you go through life with all this shit hanging over you.”

Glenn kicked his leg out and wished he’d had something solid to kick in to. “I got this shit hanging over me! It’s always been there cause you put it there!”

For once, the Old Man kept his mouth shut.

Residents had walked by to press their faces to the glass and see when it was safe to go outside, most of them more concerned about getting a smoke break than anyone’s safety. Everyone at Sunrise Manor knew Glenn and Samuel didn’t get along but had generally considered Glenn the weak side of the equation. Mitchell looked at them with real confusion, hand over his eyes against the sun shining through the window. In the last stop before death, every break from the status quo was reason enough to feel anxious. The Old Man saw Mitchell and waved him away. Mitchell stepped back but they could still see him as a shapeless blob through the glass.

Glenn stood and brushed off his uniform. As tempting as it was to leave the Old Man lying there, Glenn reached a hand out and helped him up.

After he was done groaning over every inch of upward movement, the Old Man said, “God’s witness, boy. I don’t know where them McCutcheons went. Them other things was so long ago. Anyone took part in that’s long since dead or moved on. Or senile, like Crandall. Just me, stuck in this place. Like a damn prison here. Never told you this... First month I was here they dried me out. No booze allowed. I had the shakes so bad, I like to die. After that, it’s the same day over and over. Can’t even listen to ballgames on the radio, cause there ain’t no reception. Food’s only decent cause your mother’s cooking was so bad. Never knew I’d miss those days working the road crews, outside with room to breathe. Air here stinks like old people. Can’t hardly cover it up even with cigarettes, and all’s we got is this dumpy little courtyard. This place...it’s like a conveyor.” The Old Man held a hand up vertically and slowly moved it from right to left. “Every new person comes in, every one that dies, moves me closer to the grave. Wasting my days.”

“You’re whole life’s been a waste.” Glenn’s anger had fizzled out. Hard to believe his childhood self had feared the Old Man too much and not enough at the same time. The man in front of him now had the same amorality, the same bitter tendencies, but he’d lost any power to act on it. For the first time, Glenn didn’t see the Old Man as he’d been in the past, but as he would look in the future, breathing his last in a hospital bed, and a body in a pine box bound for the earth. It brought the Old Man down to size, small enough that sweeping him off to a corner of the mind became possible. “Maybe it don’t have to be a total waste. Maybe I can fix it so those things don’t happen again.”

The Old Man looked sad, a face Glenn had never seen on him. “What you going to do? Arrest me? No one in this town’s going care about me helping round up rabblerousers thirty-some years ago.”

“I can bring the bodies out to the light of day. See what the rest of the world thinks about that.”

Glenn started to say more, to tell the Old Man he hadn’t fallen off the ladder that night he hurt his back. He looked at the shaky little man before him and decided his old tormentor had suffered enough, and would keep on suffering in this rundown building where the sun never stopped rising.

He passed Mitchell on his way through the building. Mitchell fidgeted with a shirt button and in a timid voice asked, “Everything all right?”

“I’m working on it.”

13

Glenn and Maci sat on a wood bench on the sidewalk in front of the sheriff’s office with generous portions of Helen’s coffee cake and coffee in mugs Helen kept around the office, with the Indiana state flag on the sides. A canopy the length of the block kept them in shade. Cara lay on the sidewalk under their feet, lifting her head when the odd car drove by.

“Always forget about this bench,” Glenn said. “It’s been here so long, it blends in.” He told her everything he’d learned from the Old Man. She nodded and said, “Mmm hmm,” here and there but otherwise listened, forked up small bites of cake, and returned the stares of the handful of pedestrians that passed.

After he finished, she said, “So your old man was torn up inside cause he went along with all that. Does it change what he did to you? Or how you feel about it?”

“Hard to imagine.” Glenn rubbed a hand over his head and sighed. “All those things happening here.”

Maci made a sound of disgust. “Don’t tell me you never had a history class. At least in high school. Indian resettlement, slavery, lynchings, beatings, all of that... It happened every place else, you must have had some idea of it. We’ve lived through some of it. You really think your little town escaped all that? You all might think your town developed in a bubble, but it didn’t. All that sickness about race and class superiority, it started here, crossed the ocean to the Nazis, and came back to all these little towns with Fremont and Oberlin and people like them.”

“Don’t seem real in history class. Just some stuff people wrote about. Putting faces to it. Knowing the Old Man helped do it. Feels like something I can touch now.”

Glenn took a drink from his coffee. “I told you about him falling off the ladder that time, up on the roof?”

“Back injury, right? Never recovered? That’s what forced him to go in the rest home?”

“Yeah. He didn’t fall.”

He told her about an especially bad beating. Most times the Old Man had just hit him; the child would fall and cry. He’d learned to cry quiet, cause sobbing just invited another punch. One day the Old Man broke the pattern and threw Glenn, probably twelve or thirteen by then, across the room. Put a hole in the drywall two feet wide.

“He saw his days were numbered,” Maci interrupted. “You were getting bigger and you were either going to leave or stand up to him.”

“Didn’t feel like it was ever going to end.” He told her more about his only friend Dennis. The two of them would go fishing, or exploring the forest, anything to get out of that house and keep his wits about him. Dennis was the only soul he’d ever told about the abuse because Dennis was the only one that asked. Others were sure to have known about it, all the black eyes he showed up to school with, and never tried to help. Had it been Dennis’ idea? Glenn remembered coming up with it himself, but it seemed more like Dennis’ way of thinking.

*****

GLENN HAD WAITED till one night when the Old Man was a few beers into a televised ball game. Where had his mother been? Probably in bed; she’d slept a lot, or stayed in there to avoid getting beat up herself. Had the cancer started showing itself by then? He understood now, as an adult, the Old Man had always been an easy target, as weak as any garden-variety bully. Glenn’s teenage self hadn’t known that, he’d just been scared half to death.

He’d pulled a section of nylon rope out of the garage. Took him eight or ten throws to catch it on the aerial antenna, in a gusty wind ahead of a summer storm. He remembered sweating and that wind snapping at him loaded with cool moisture. He yanked the antenna off kilter. That was the most important part. He couldn’t pull it all the way down or it would have had to wait till the next day. He just pulled it enough to break up the reception. That had been too tempting for the Old Man to sit still for.

Samuel had yelled for Glenn to help but Glenn stayed hidden around the corner while the Old Man hauled the rickety wood ladder out of the garage and leaned it against the black shingle roof. Once the Old Man was up there fussing with the antenna, Glenn had to climb up without being seen. The dark helped but the storm was the real bonus. Covered up the creaking steps of the ladder. Glenn had kept his head down till the Old Man turned the opposite direction, on his knees to twist the antenna around.

If he lived to the end of time, he’d never forget fear rattling through him like a seizure. His vision shorted out, like it always did, so he couldn’t focus more than a few feet away. He’d shook and cried out in the hissing wind. The rain had probably started by then, or maybe he’d just been crying and got the two mixed up. He tripped on the roof but fell forward so it made no difference.

Some part of him never left that roof top. He’d stood there with a dumb look on his face and the rain had definitely come down hard by then. The Old Man’s arms and legs had splayed out and he’d floated in the air long enough that Glenn half expected him to take flight. He’d fallen no more than fifteen feet, but he hit at a bad angle. The storm had covered any sound of him hitting the ground.

He’d heard the yelling, though, the Old Man’s screechy, cigarette-rough voice wailing up in the night. Glenn hadn’t known what the fall would do. Would the Old Man die? He’d halfway thought he’d kick off himself, his heart was drumming so heavy.

The Old Man’s pain and the dark had covered up Glenn’s descent. He’d jumped off the ladder three steps from the bottom and fell face-down in the wet grass. He’d jumped up and ran like the wind across the field behind the house. He’d slid in the grass and mud a couple more times before he was out of sight. The Old Man had gone quiet by then. Glenn had known the streets enough by that age to run to the river without thinking.

*****

GLENN LEANED BACK in his chair and sipped his coffee. “Camped out with Dennis a few days after that. It was summer. No school absence to worry about.”

“Clearly your dad lived through it,” Maci said. “Your folks didn’t put two and two together? Your dad falls and you go missing?”

“I don’t even think they noticed I was gone. You believe that? The Old Man was in the hospital a good couple weeks. I guess my mom was just happy to have a quiet house for a spell. Dennis was always finding ways to keep up with local talk. He put it together that, far as anybody knew, the Old Man just fell from his own recklessness. Nobody ever thought to blame me. Just a dumb, awkward kid, why would they?”

They finished off the coffee cake and held the paper plates in their laps.

“The Old Man never hit me again. Always talked like he was in a lot of pain. I reckon he knew just what you said, I was getting big enough to turn on him. With that bad back he couldn’t do much to defend himself. Sure couldn’t keep up with me if I ran. I never stopped being afraid of him, though. Even that night, looking at him laying on his back in the rain, there was part of me expected him to run me down and beat me. Going after him like I did this morning... That’s the first time I saw how sad he really is.”

Glenn sighed and stared out at the street scene he’d looked at nearly every day of his adult life. “Keep thinking about that boy in my dream. He didn’t understand how broken up his life was cause it was all he’d seen. Part of me knew that stuff wasn’t supposed to happen, but... I was all alone, you know? Couldn’t put together the words to say what was wrong or how to ask for help... None of that.”

Maci held up the paper plate her cake had been on. “If you live in a place this size, and you never go past the edges, you’re going to think this is the whole world.” She dropped the plate on the sidewalk and wiggled her feet on the concrete around the paper circle. “There’s this whole world outside, but if you can’t see it, you’ll never even know what you’re missing. Even if you can see it, if you don’t have the freedom to go there, it’ll just look like Here there be dragons territory and you’ll go on being ignorant about the world. Like the kid in your dream. He could see across the river, but it might as well have been the other side of the world for all the good it did him. All he had to do was pick up and run for help. Sometimes that’s the difference between life and death. Landscapes get defined by where we don’t go as much as where we do go.”

She picked up the plate and gave it a tender look, as if she really held a small world in her hands. “They say ignorance is bliss. I don’t buy it. You grew up not knowing how much world was there for you. I’m still not sure you know. You don’t seem too blissful to me.”

They had waited long enough. They went in the office, gathered up chalk, the canteens, and the new flashlights from Hopewell’s. Glenn left word with Helen where they were headed and marked it on a map this time. Maci and Glenn hadn’t talked about it, but each instinctively knew they could no longer put off returning to the cave.

*****

THEY LOADED CARA into the car and drove out to the same isolated road where they’d parked before. Made the familiar hike along the river toward the cave entrance. A small flock of blackbirds stirred and squawked over the river when they arrived, already distraught by a prior disturbance. The birds carted through the air in connect-the-dot abstractions, then scattered up and away as Cara darted ahead of her human companions.

“At least we know what we’re looking for this time,” Maci said as they hiked up the riverbank, more to herself than Glenn. “Bodies.”

“When we were here before,” Glenn said, “I didn’t even think of what else might have been in there. Not having our lights and all.” Who else is what he meant. The thought of finding the McCutcheons, or any other human remains in that cold darkness, had him blinking and twitching his head to chase off the image.

A breeze set the leaves in motion, papery wind chimes that balanced the birds’ crying. Nearing the cave entrance, another sound peaked through. They slowed to decipher the noise, a repetitive clunk of wood against wood. Overgrowth limited their range of sight to ten to twenty feet in most directions. Cara’s fur stood up on her back; she growled but a shh from Glenn quieted her. Maci raised a hand and, with the flashlight she carried, gestured for them to go left, away from the river, on a roundabout route to the cave.

“What are the odds?” she whispered. They took measured steps with heads ducked low. “Someone else shows up out here a few weeks after we find the tunnel?”

“Could be whoever took our lights last time?”

She nodded. “Still not a coincidence. It’s the same someone, and if they’re here the only days we’ve been here, they’re regulars. Whoever took our lights did it because we interrupted them.”

Maci seemed to understand what that meant but Glenn had to work on it. They stopped near the cave entrance, a good distance into the forest from the water. They could still hear the clunking sound. Cara sniffed the ground but kept her eyes peeled, her tail extended on a straight line from her back.

“Let’s get a closer look,” Maci said. She moved the flashlight to her left hand to free her gun hand. Glenn saw her and did the same. They exchanged looks and shook their heads, agreeing it was premature to draw their firearms.

By then the wood-on-wood sound had stopped. The blackbirds continued to flutter and complain in the surrounding trees. Cara let out a squeak and sat, head hanging, ears flat against her head.

The dog’s motion had barely registered with them when a shotgun exploded. The trunk of a birch tree splintered behind their heads.

Maci and Glenn crouched low and pulled their guns.

They recognized the lazy drawl that shouted at them through the trees. “Glad to see your dog made it, Deputy. You can meet your maker together now.”

“Randall,” Glenn hissed. Another shotgun blast flitted through the leaves to their side. Two more followed straight away. “Dittmer and Williams must be with him.”

“And your pretty FBI girlfriend’s here,” Randall said. “Good to have company at the end, isn’t it?”

Another shot threw up clumps of dirt in front of them.

“They’re getting closer,” Maci whispered.

“I don’t get it,” Glenn said, “If they kill us, won’t everyone know?”

“Do I have to spell it out for you?” Maci’s voice went up an octave. “No one’s going to know they killed us. We’re about to go where the McCutcheons went.”

Glenn looked over his shoulder to the cave entrance. He imagined wandering in those dark tunnels with ghosts.

Maci got off two shots but they couldn’t even see the troopers. “We don’t have a lot of options here, Glenn.”

Glenn twisted toward the cave again, then back toward their foes as two shots hit the ground on either side. One hit the base of a sweetgum tree and scattered chunks of bark. He forced himself to speak the unspeakable.

“We got to go in there. It’s what we came for anyway.”

Maci glanced back, then fired her gun again. “You really want to be trapped in there with these clowns? They took our lights last time, remember?”

“They don’t know what we know.”

“And that is?” Maci started to fire, but a shot from the troopers hit the birch tree again. The top half of the tree, fifteen feet of it, toppled over and balanced against surrounding trees.

“How to get out.”

Maci froze and looked at him. “Shit.”

She looked in the direction of the approaching enemy; at the dog, cowering behind them and shaking over the noise; at Glenn, doing a good share of shaking himself. She gave a sharp nod. “Go.”

Maci fired a couple of cover shots as they ran. Glenn finally had the presence of mind to do the same. Half a dozen wood crates the size of bankers boxes sat open outside the mine tunnel that led into the cave. Running past, they caught a glimpse in the crates of ragged clothing, jewelry, stone artifacts, and what looked like bones.

“Did I really see that?” Maci asked as they entered the tunnel. They turned on their flashlights and walked at a near jog over the bumpy ground. Cara had rocketed ahead of them; as she had done in the forest, she launched into a pattern of running ahead, then backtracking to urge them forward.

Glenn was too spooked to know what to say.

They saw more wood crates lined up in the mine tunnel. Some full, or half-full, or still empty. Entering the cave, Glenn’s chalk plus-signs from the first trip were still visible. Cara became less enthusiastic about going forward but kept up her forward-and-back movement. Her sense of smell guided her faster than any light could.

They were deep into the cave when they entered a broad room. They had passed this area before but since then the smaller rocks had been arranged to create a more level area of dusty limestone. Wood crates, like the ones in the mine tunnel but more of them, maybe thirty, sat open in a careless arrangement.

Maci stopped to poke around in one of the boxes. Bones that looked human, covered in ratty fragments of clothes, and a weathered pair of leather boots.

“They know we’re in here.” Glenn tried to urge her on. “Won’t take them long to make it back this far.”

“Jesus.” Maci wiped sweat from her forehead and frowned over the relics. “They’re boxing up all the evidence to get rid of it. All of it. All that stuff your old man told you about.” She directed her flashlight over the row of boxes. “They’re whitewashing everything. It’ll be like it never happened.”

Glenn looked in a different box. “Everything’s always getting covered up. That’s the way it’s always happened.” A rusted metal canteen lay among Indian arrowheads, coins covered with dirt, and about a dozen keys on an Indianapolis Colts key chain with the football team’s horseshoe logo. He impulsively grabbed the keys and put them in his pocket.

A growing echo of voices told them the troopers were approaching.

“We got to go,” Glenn said. “We can figure out the rest later.”

Maci stood, light in one hand and gun in the other. “They took our lights. Now we need to take theirs.”

“Won’t that mean we got to wait till they’re up close?”

She nodded.

“And turn off our lights?”

Another nod.

They moved to a narrower section of cave and took shelter behind rock formations. Glenn nudged Cara behind him and out of harm’s way. It took all of two seconds to agree that Maci had the steadier aim. They clicked off the flashlights and waited. The echoing sounds of boots on gravel and speculating voices, the swerving beams of flashlights, marked the troopers’ confident approach. Maci hooked her light to her belt and took measured breaths. Glenn tried his best to shield the dog and become invisible.

The three troopers were almost on top of them when Maci leaned from behind the limestone shelf. In direct line with the light beams, she kept her eyes squinted. At her signal, Glenn flipped his light on and aimed it in the troopers’ eyes. They stood white as ghosts in the artificial light. Maci fired half a dozen shots. She wished she had more time to reflect on what must have been a Bureau first, trying to strand fellow law enforcement officers in a cave in an act of self-defense. She aimed wide, preferring to miss than hit flesh. Injuries she could live with, but federal influence wouldn’t stick its neck out to protect a Black woman who accidentally killed state troopers, no matter how corrupt.

The troopers returned the gunfire but they were in each other’s way and, to be honest, were too lazy to have ever honed their marksmanship. Shattering glass and plastic accompanied the explosive echoes, careening shadows, and hollering from the troopers. Glenn turned his light off and they were in suffocating darkness again. One of the troopers, maybe Dittmer, kept up a round of yelling for several seconds. The troopers got off a few more shots, eruptions of light bursting over panicked faces, but they had lost their direction.

“Let’s go,” Maci whispered. Having been here before didn’t make it any easier. They advanced one step at a time, hands out to feel for the cave walls. Cara quickly figured out the preferred direction and the sound of her panting helped keep them oriented. Behind them, the troopers fussed with each other about injured hands and which direction to go and whether they should try to get out now or follow those damn troublemakers and teach them a permanent lesson. Judging from what little they could make out, and the sound of boots on rock that persisted, Randall and his friends decided to follow.

Maci’s and Glenn’s nerves created their own feeling of motion and made it feel as if they were walking faster than they really were. While they were outpacing the troopers, progress was still slow enough to let the chilly dark grind down their souls. They held hands again to avoid being separated. They remembered the general lay of the passageways but banged their heads, arms, and torsos against the immovable limestone. Glenn tripped once and scraped his knee; he felt blood but couldn’t determine more than that. He gritted through the pain and tried to take full measure of Maci’s words of encouragement.

“Listen.” Maci gripped his hand. They could barely hear the troopers’ clattering behind them. More important, they were within earshot of the stream that had guided them out before.

At the stream they risked turning on their lights a few seconds to orient themselves. Cara lapped up the icy water. The dog stayed out of the water as long as possible while Glenn and Maci froze their legs in the stream. Finally the passage became too narrow. The dog hesitated, but Maci tried to make it a game by calling softly to Cara and splashing the water. Cara followed them for a few minutes, then came around to the experience and swam ahead of them wherever the water was deep enough. For a while the troopers’ voices hung over them. Soon enough, they were, for all intents and purposes, alone. They clicked on the lights from time to time, glittering on the colorful gravel in the crystal clear water.

The cold chilled their hearts as they moved closer to the dreaded moment. Glenn whispered the first distraction that came into his head.

“That guy in Chicago,” he said, “the one that got shot. It was really an accident? You didn’t set him up, like he said. Right?”

She was quiet for so long, he figured she’d decided not to answer.

“I gave that guy more space in my head than he deserved.” She took another long pause. “I thought sometimes about jumping him in the parking garage or someplace. Give him one good kick in the teeth. I really thought about it, you know, I could see his eyes bug out, and that bigot smirk come off his face forever. I’d never do it, but...” He couldn’t see her grin but could hear it in her voice. “Didn’t hurt my mood none to think about it. Truth is, I forgot my cousin lived in that building. I knew she was using, last time I saw her, but me and her hadn’t even talked in months. Just say we’re in different circles.” She winced at bumping her knee against rock under water. “I may be a hothead, but I’m not stupid. It wasn’t a set-up. Either way, somebody leaked, and I’m the most visible candidate. If my boss can scope out the real source of the leak, my life will be a lot better.”

They reached the underwater passage. They flipped the lights on and off to confirm their orientation and that it truly was the only path forward. They hadn’t been able to see the first time that the cave ceiling was oppressively low, so much that they would have banged their heads on rock if they’d moved out of the stream. The mass of the planet seemed to bear down on them, warning them that they’d already seen too much of the underworld and had best leave before the darkness decided to keep them forever.

Still, Glenn sat on a section of boulder high enough to keep his feet above the water. Maci sat next to him, no more eager to make that terrible swim. They judged it safe now to keep the flashlights on.

“Do we have most of the pieces now?” Her words came out as a deep sigh. “We can put enough of it together so at least it makes sense?”

“Goes back to Missy McCutcheon’s relatives, don’t you think? Sounds like she had a grandpa and her uncle, Crandall, both involved in...” He waved his hands. “All the different things that happened here.”

“They saw that picture of her grandfather. Got curious. Probably asked Crandall; we’ve seen how cooperative he is. So they came out here to do some digging on their own. Maybe they wanted to understand their family’s history. Or they could have been hoping for buried treasure. They must have run into the troopers from hell. Maybe caught them in the act of removing artifacts and asked the wrong questions. We must have been here at a bad time, just like the McCutcheons. When the troopers heard we made it out, they started giving you warnings. Shot out the window, poisoned the dog.” She reached out to Cara, fidgeting on the rocks next to them, understanding there was a threat but not knowing how to respond in this strange environment.

“That means those troopers are doing the same thing people have done since the beginning,” Glenn fumed. “Stranding people in here ‘cause of their skin color, or politics, or what have you.”

“Preservation of power,” Maci said. “But you’ve seen the pattern. The people with true power aren’t the ones doing the dirty work. They always recruit people like Crandall or your old man to take the risks for them. We said it before. Randall and his friends aren’t ambitious enough to get into this on their own. Somebody out there wants all this mess cleaned up. Either they want the cave or the land over it, or they just want the evidence gone once and for all. Could be someone wants to put a factory here, or a big farming company wants to buy it.”

“Wait a minute.” Glenn removed his black, fake leather wallet from his back pocket. When he fumbled, Maci took the light so Glenn could remove Walter Joyce’s business card. “This Joyce character. What if a company he works for is trying to do something?”

“Yeah, I’ve been thinking about him,” Maci took the card. “He hasn’t exactly been subtle about his presence. What he told you is true. Guys like him, it’s like they’ve got diplomatic immunity. Everyone’s guilty and no one gets blamed.”

“First time I met him, it sounded like he was just passing through. Then he turned up at the funeral. I reckoned he was just looking for leads. Talking up somebody that knew the lay of the land.”

“I’ve also been thinking about something Jeffrey Slocum told us. When the kids tried to start the commune? He said a lumber company was sniffing around the area at the same time. Why’d the state buy the land? Why didn’t they back the lumber company? I wonder if somebody somewhere knew what a business would find if they set up shop here. The state could have stepped in to keep all the skeletons in the closet.” She snapped the business card against her hand. “Do we even need to know the end goal? Kill anyone that gets in the way of profit and power, that’s the bottom line. The state’s always going to protect both. That means they’re covering up whatever skeletons might make a company look suspicious.”

Glenn pocketed the card and doused his flashlight. They sat quiet for a few breaths.

“We got to go, Glenn,” Maci said. “If we go back, we run into the guys that are trying to kill us. If they backtrack and manage to find their way out before we do, they could be waiting for us outside, and we’ll be in the same fix. This is the only way out.” She grasped his shoulder. “You’ve already done this. You know you can get through it.”

“I don’t feel like I know it,” Glenn moaned. “And even if I can...” He pointed to the dog.

Cara wiggled and wagged her tail when they both looked at her, evidently hoping for instructions or at least some food.

“We could come back for her?” Maci’s heart wasn’t in the idea. 

“If those guys don’t find her, she’d probably find them. We know how long she’d last then.”

“Okay... We figured out I’m the stronger swimmer, right? You’re not going to lose face over that?” Maci’s voice was down to a whisper. Glenn shook his head. “You hold on to Cara. I’ll hold on to you. Hold your breath and kick like the devil.”

Glenn put his hands on the dog’s head and held back tears as best he could. Maci thumped him on the back and scratched Cara’s ears.

They stood in position where the water flowed under the rock. They turned off the flashlights and clipped them to their belts. Maci stretched her arms and shoulders. She quickly lowered her head under to get oriented and minimize the shock of the frigid water. Glenn closed his eyes and took a series of deep breaths. He set his hands on the dog to try to reassure her and to figure out the best way to keep a tight grip on her when they went under.

“Sorry, girl,” he whispered, not fully sure what he was sorry about, having to hurt the dog or getting hurt himself.

“All right,” Maci inhaled deeply. “Deep breaths. We’re going to make it.”

Glenn nodded, as ready as he would ever be. They shoved under. Glenn gripped the dog tight against him, one arm around her neck and the other around her midsection. Cara fought against him, all those centuries of evolution telling her to flee.  Maci dragged him by the collar of his uniform. He tried to remember to kick his legs, like Maci had said, but it didn’t seem to contribute much.

The trip felt a lot longer this time. They both banged around and lost distinction between up and down. The black turned blue and yellow and red and starbursts flashed until they opened their eyes and then the black returned and slowed them down and threatened to become permanent.

They emerged sputtering and coughing the water out of their lungs. The dog tried to yelp but had to clear out water herself. All three of them staggered and fell on the narrow, sandy bank of the stream. Glenn had injured his back. Maci grabbed at her bleeding forehead and tensed against the pain. Only the dog remained awake, licking the faces of the unconscious humans and crying to them to help her understand.

*****

THE DARKNESS GAVE no sense of how much time had passed when they opened their eyes. Maci groaned, and Glenn rolled on his side and took in slow, painful breaths. Cara had lain beside them and jumped up to sniff at them when they moved. They kept quiet for a while, feeling out their wounds, figuring out if consciousness was a false promise or if they’d really live.

After a few minutes, hearing no trace of their enemies, they sat upright and turned on the flashlights. Maci had a bruise and a scratch across her forehead with a thunderous headache. Glenn could walk with a limp but his back spasmed with every step. Cara, for all she’d been through, looked to be the healthiest of the bunch. Maci scratched the dog’s head and talked slowly because the effort rumbled through the back of her head.

“You saved us, girl,” she said to the dog. “If you hadn’t marched us through there, we’d still be back where those bastards could catch us.”

They stood, pausing to scan the lights around the place they’d navigated in total darkness before. As they’d figured the first time, they were in a dry, lifeless section of cave.

“Going to be slow going,” Glenn said. He gave Maci a worried look. “Need to get back and get your head checked out soon, though.”

“Yeah, it’s not good,” she said. “Let’s not rush it now.”

They leaned on each other and trudged out of the cave. Once they got near the exit, with faint light emanating through the tunnel, Cara gave a friendly woof and charged ahead. Two shadowed figures with flashlights came toward them.

“Glenn! Agent Fontaines! Is that you?” It was Josh Avery, a claustrophobic Dennis not far behind.

Josh was the only one with the energy for conversation. “Helen told me where you went. I tracked down Dennis here, he led me to the cave entrance.”

“No entrance,” Maci said. “An exit’s all we need.”

Maci leaned on Josh and Dennis supported Glenn. Cara ran in front of them, jubilant to be back to a world she recognized.

“Let’s get out of here, partners,” Dennis said. “This place is giving me fits.”

“You don’t know the half of it,” Glenn said. They hobbled into sunlight so intense it made the world glow white, through the forest to the sheriff’s cruiser that Josh was now driving. Glenn told Josh and Dennis the short version of events. He gave Josh the key chain he’d pulled out of the box as evidence that items recovered by Randall and his colleagues weren’t entirely decades old. “Colts moved to Indiana, wasn’t it three years ago? That key chain's no older than that.”

Maci smiled through her haze. “Good eye, Glenn. You might be sheriff material, after all.”

14

The little hospital in Concord kept Maci overnight for observation. She had narrowly avoided a concussion, according to the doctor. Glenn and Maci answered questions from her bedside while agents from the FBI field office in Indianapolis, along with Josh, recovered the three state troopers. Dennis had slipped away into the forest once authorities began showing up. Jeffrey Slocum had raised red flags with reporters in Indianapolis. Then he sent academics and non-profit groups sniffing around the cave. One way or another, the little town’s secrets would be dragged into the light of day.

Glenn stayed with Maci as late as the hospital permitted and until painkillers relieved his back enough to fold himself into a car seat and drive home. He dodged her questions about whether he would campaign for the sheriff’s position.

“Only three people in this town I’d ever miss,” he said. “One’s dead. One’s moving out west. Dennis is the only friend I got left here.”

That night, the only human in the house for the first time in weeks, Glenn threw a stick for Cara to chase in the yard. He’d never even seen a beach in real life, and he wondered how the dog would like running across the sand.

He pulled out the tape player and Herbie Mann cassette Maci had picked up for him that day in Indianapolis. Glenn had never heard the like of the rock/jazz/r&b hybrid, terms he wouldn’t have understood anyway. He played a few notes with his own flute, less awkward with no spectator present (except for tilted-head confusion from the dog), but mostly listened as the music filled him with an exhilarating sense of peace. He didn’t fall asleep on the couch, but instead slept in his own bed, and used the breathing technique Maci had taught him to quiet his mind, with the dog sleeping on the floor alongside. He woke up several times during the night, took one of the painkillers once, but the sound of the dog’s sleep breathing calmed him somehow, and he drifted under again.

He was up before sunrise and sat outside with the dog. He ate a piece of dry toast, since there was no butter left in the house, and drank strong coffee while the light of day shooed away the shadows and thought, for the first time, how he liked sunrises better than sunsets.

Maci had already checked out of the hospital by the time he drove up. A small scar and discoloration on her forehead, and a cautious manner of walking, were the only visible signs of her head wound.

“No karate kicks for me for awhile,” she said when she eased herself into the passenger seat.

They stopped by the house so she could pack up her suitcase, then went to Hopewell’s diner for breakfast and took a booth overlooking the sidewalk. With no more case to investigate, during Maci’s last hours in town, neither of them cared much if they inspired gossip among the locals. The TV broadcast the wrap-up of the Iran-Contra hearings. They ate omelets and pancakes and hash browns and tried to steer around the distance that was about to separate them after their surprising friendship had sprung up so quickly.

“You never told me your plans,” she said. “About if you’re going to go after the sheriff’s job.”

He stared out the window for a long time before answering. “I was thinking last night about that place you talked about. Belize? How you felt connected there. I grew up here, but I never felt that kind of connection to this place. Learning about these things that have been happening here all this time, it got me thinking about...like you said, how the places we don’t go are as important as the places we are.”

“Sure. Every choice is a rejection of all the other choices, all the different ways those choices change our lives. Those absent places define us as much as all the rest.”

“I look at someone like Dennis, how bad this town treated him. Even when he was a kid. But when we were hiking through that forest, I kept thinking about how strange it felt to me, like a foreign land or something. Dennis, man, he’s got a foothold on this place. He hikes down that riverbank like he’s part of it. He knows all the ins and outs. There’s part of him belongs here. Always will.”

Maci nudged a bite of pancake into syrup with her fork. “Where do you belong?”

“What if I don’t belong anywhere?”

She laughed. “You really believe that? You need to get out more.”

They got distracted by the hearings on television, where Senator Inouye from Hawaii made his closing comments.

“It is a story of the National Security Council staff becoming a dominant organ of foreign policy and shutting out those who disagreed with its views. It is a story of how a great nation betrayed the principles which have made it great, and thereby became hostage to hostage-takers. And, sadly, once the unsound policies began to unravel, it became a story of a cover-up, of shredding and altering of the historical record, and of fall guy plans suitable for a grade-B movie, not a great power.”

“I tell you,” Maci said, “if we don’t put that SOB Ollie in jail...woe unto us, for our days are surely numbered.” She looked at Glenn. “They’re calling this a year without heroes. After seeing the two of us in action...I’m not buying it.”

They settled up the bill and stood outside by Maci’s rental car. Glenn put his hands in his pockets and looked at the ground and everyplace else except her eyes.

“I’m ready for home,” Maci said, “but I’ve sure enjoyed our conversations, Glenn. Stay in touch, I want to know what you decide about the sheriff’s job. And be good to Cara, she’ll be good right back.”

“Got so used to you being around.” Glenn kicked at the sidewalk. “Won’t be the same. You want to see if Helen’s got some coffee cake left to take with you?”

She laughed, put a hand on his shoulder, and stood on her toes to kiss him on the cheek. “You watch your back, Glenn. You ever want to hop a plane to Belize, you’ve got my number.”

With that, she drove off, waving goodbye through a rolled down window.

*****

HE DROVE PAST the McCutcheon house, still getting the once over from the state police. The question he’d never thought to ask, the information no neighbor shared because they had no reason to think it was important: Randall’s state vehicle had been seen several times at the house after the family went missing; it didn’t raise flags with anyone because he and Angie lived close by. It didn’t hurt that the keys Glenn recovered from the cave opened the front and back doors on the McCutcheon house. That turned the house into a crime scene and by the time the authorities were finished tearing the place apart, it would have lost considerable financial value. Bad news for the pastor and his church’s assets.

Late in the afternoon, after a day stewing in the office and listening to Helen comment about how quiet the office seemed with Maci gone, and still too close to tears to even bring up the sheriff, Josh reported early. They finished the paperwork to give Josh permanent use of the department’s cruiser and Glenn to take title to Josh’s beat-up Chevrolet Blazer. “It’s getting up there in miles,” Josh said, “but it’ll get you where you’re going and then some.”

So Glenn could get more practice driving the full-size Blazer, they drove it over to Church Street and ambled down to Dennis’ encampment.

“I know you guys met before,” Glenn said as they stepped and slipped down the dirt embankment. “I figured you should get to know each other some, see if you both like my idea.”

Dennis greeted them with palm slaps and offered hot coffee he’d just brewed, real coffee a fisherman friend had shared, in old ceramic mugs he’d scavenged over the years. They sat along the river bank and sipped the hot drinks. They talked a little about the cave and the horrible artifacts being removed from it. Confronted by higher ups, the troopers had folded in no time; Joyce was the one told them to finish boxing up every last relic or artifact and cart it off to a landfill. Now everything that remained was being photographed and inventoried, and it looked like even Joyce might answer for a few things. Joyce might go to the grave refusing to name who was pulling his strings, but accountability had reached out and grabbed him in spite of his boasting. The state held some red-faced news conferences and promised to become “a better steward of the land in a way that’s respectful of our native brothers.” Whatever that meant. Time would tell if the decision-making could be traced up to a corporation or someone in the state government. Or both.

“Wanted to ask you about something, Dennis,” Glenn launched into his purpose for being there. “There’s a fair chance Josh here is going to be the next sheriff.”

Dennis looked crushed. Living comfortably outside town politics, he’d assumed his friend would get the job and that would work in his favor. He was friendly with Josh, but the younger man was a wild card.

“He’ll bring in a deputy full-time,” Glenn said. “But he’s going to need part-time help on top of that. Just like he’s been doing up to now.”

Dennis blinked. “You ain’t going to be the sheriff...or the deputy?”

Glenn shook his head. “Best if we talk about that later. But I got to thinking...no one knows the lay of this town like you. You know every house, every street, you know the river and the forest. Nobody’d be more help to him than you.”

“I can’t take me an office job, Glenn.” Dennis hunched over his coffee mug. “You know that.”

“You wouldn’t need to be in the office,” Josh said. “We’d give you a walkie-talkie to stay in contact. Keep living right here if you want. Doesn’t pay a whole lot, but it’s something.” He held up his free hand. “Now, there’d be some requirements. You’d have to wear a uniform once in a while. You’d have to be reliable, in terms of me being able to reach you when I need to. Might need to get a haircut, just cause, you know how folks around here can get. Mostly I need someone can get around town in ways I can’t. Someone who sees things I won’t be able to see. You might do surveillance, keep an eye on crime scenes, call in suspicious activity. Glenn’s right, I can’t think of a better person.”

“We know you’re honest, Dennis,” Glenn said. “Don’t matter what anyone else says. You clean up a little, show everyone what you know...they’ll come around.”

Dennis looked across the river, water a bright blue-gray as the sun peeked over the trees one last time before setting. “Never had a regular job before...”

“Think it over,” Glenn said. “You both got the kind of integrity the sheriff wanted in the department. I’d feel a lot better knowing I’m leaving things in your hands.”

Dennis frowned. “Where you going?”

Glenn put a hand on his shoulder. “You’re going to think I lost my mind.”

*****

THE REAL ESTATE AGENT met him at the house next morning before he went to the office. A bubbly, heavyset woman in her sixties who came over from Concord because “we don’t see a whole lot of activity in Sommersville, keeping an office there doesn’t add up economically.” She carried a clipboard and tilted her head to see through a pair of bifocals. Glenn walked her through the house but she already knew Windsor Estate’s history and gave him honest-sounding estimates of what he could sell it for and how long it would take. She made polite conversation about his family and his future plans, but he directed her back to how friendly the neighbors were and how, as far as he could tell, the plumbing and electrical were in good shape. They worked out how many of the furnishings he could leave behind.

They walked around the outside and shook hands by her long, white Cadillac in the driveway.

“Now it’s going to be a few days before I can put a sign up and get the real marketing started,” she said. “It’s like we talked about, at that price I think you’ll have a buyer before long.”

Glenn said that sounded just fine.

He went to work and locked himself in his office. Figuring he might not be the only one who didn’t like surprises, he worked up the nerve to call Maci and tell her what he was thinking. He nearly fell out of his chair when she said, “If you’re ready to take that risk, let’s see what happens.”

Helen wasn’t happy about his plans but she was never going to bond with Glenn the way she had with Marvin Howard, who would always be the sheriff no matter who held the title. He took one last look in the sheriff’s office, the ugly couch still reminding them of all they’d lost. He wished again the Sheriff was still alive to bounce his ideas off of. Thinking about the sheriff’s history, Glenn could imagine his old advisor worrying about darkness reaching out for the deputy for daring to tempt fate.

Glenn felt out of place when he changed into civilian clothes, a blue t-shirt and jeans. Helen teared up and sent him home with a piece of coffee cake.

“So much change,” she said. “I guess we can’t stop it, but some days I just want to go back, you know?”

At the house that night, Glenn filled trash bags with photos, papers, all the personal items that were too small or too broken down to donate or sell. He paused before he tossed the box of pictures from his childhood, then dropped it in a garbage bag.

He’d had more than enough of old photographs.

The trash bin was overflowing by the time he finished. No matter. The less of the past he carried with him, the better. Cara trotted around at his heels, hoping to find a game in all the activity. He played that Herbie Mann tape all the way through a few times. Loaded his clothes into his one suitcase and tossed it in the trunk of the car. Rustled up the cooler from the garage and cleaned it out. After dark he tried sitting on the back porch but that empty chair kept looking at him. He threw a tennis ball for the dog and debated if he was doing the right thing.

He turned on the TV expecting another late night science-fiction film but instead tonight, for the first time in longer than he could remember, they showed a mainstream movie, this one from the sixties called In the Heat of the Night. Glenn had heard of the movie but it wasn’t the kind of thing that got much talk in most small towns. Watching that Black policeman elbow his way through the southern town made him wonder if Maci had felt like that, right in front of him all that time, looking at the town and seeing hate reflected back. Somehow it helped him understand how angry she’d been when the three troopers stopped her that morning.

He went through a round of second thoughts. It was crazy to turn his life inside out, but those hours in the cave had coerced something out of him that his time with Maci had nurtured.

He fell asleep one last night on the couch. The dog jumped up and curled around his feet. He slept better than expected considering he was about to jump off a cliff. He dreamed about trying to detassel a corn field but the work was already done. A pit opened up in the ground in front of him and he could hear the Old Man calling at him from down below but no way he was jumping into that darkness. The Sheriff was there, leaning against his car parked by the road, eyes hid behind sunglasses, waving and nodding his head. At the edge of the field he came on to a beach with palm trees and little waves rolling in off a vast, blue ocean. Is that what beaches really looked like up close? He floated over the rich jungle coast, immersed in the greens and blues of daily rain showers and new leaves on every tree.

He woke before sunrise. Cara did her usual fidgeting about until he fed her and let her out in the yard. He packed some Cokes, a pitcher of water, some peanut butter sandwiches, and the coffee cake in the cooler. Took a final walk through the house. The real estate woman said he could take care of the utilities by phone once the house sold. He looked in the bedroom where he’d tried to hide from the Old Man all those times and cried himself to sleep more than a few nights. He wasn’t sure how he felt because he hadn’t ever thought about leaving.

When he opened the front door, Cara burst out and ran straight to the car. He locked up and put the house key under the welcome mat, the old rubber criss-cross mat that the real estate woman said she would replace right away, because this one looked older than the hills and probably was. Cara sat alert in the passenger seat and Glenn sipped from a thermos of coffee on a slow drive through town. Sun still wasn’t fully up yet and he didn’t know when he’d be back. Main Street was still empty except for a light inside Hopewell’s where they were getting ready for the breakfast crowd. He reminded himself to send Miss Oberlin a card once he got settled someplace, to thank her for her kindness.

He’d never felt alert enough to keep this many different thoughts in his head at once.

Crossing the river toward SR 24, he bobbled his head trying to spot Dennis. Most likely, Dennis was asleep after scrounging for food during the safest hours when most people were in bed. On the side opposite town, he slowed down at the ruins from the old horse ferry. A stable had operated there, just like in his dream. He’d started to imagine the kid from the dream as a real person, someone to feel sorry for but somehow like a part of himself. The feeling still gave him a shiver in unsettled moments.

The rising sun lighted up the farmland ahead, leading the way west toward I-65. He expected to hit heavy traffic around Gary and into Chicago. Best to enjoy the quiet road while he could.

“Probably be there in less than two hours, even with all that city traffic,” he said to Cara. “Be there before lunchtime. That’s why I like sunrises better than sunsets. Still plenty of daylight left.”

Author’s Note:

The Iran-Contra hearings, more formally known as the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran and the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition, took place from May 5 to August 6, 1987. I have taken liberties with dates of testimony, but quotes included here come directly from the hearing transcripts. Partial transcripts of the hearings can be found at Brown University’s “Understanding the Iran-Contra Affairs” Web site.

There is a U.S. Route 24 in Indiana. The State Road 24 that passes through Sommersville is, like the town and its inhabitants, entirely fictional.

As of this writing, the Miami of Indiana continue to be denied Federal recognition as an independent Miami nation.

Lost Souls is a work of fiction but the following sources provided valuable historical context. Any errors in facts or interpretation are, of course, my own.

Currell, Susan and Christina Cogdell, editors. Popular Eugenics: National Efficiency and American Mass Culture in the 1930s, Ohio University Press, 2006.

Greene, Ann Norton. Horses at Work: Harnessing Power in Industrial America, Harvard University Press, 2008.

Jensen, Derrick. The Culture of Make Believe, Chelsea Green Publishing, 2004.

Rafert, Stewart. The Miami Indians of Indiana: A Persistent People, 1654-1994, Indiana Historical Society Press, 1999.

Simons, Richard S. and Francis H. Parker. Railroads of Indiana, Indiana University Press, 1997.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Bradley Bravard is a graduate of Purdue University and the Neeley School of Business at Texas Christian University. In such varied careers as market consulting, healthcare, and software, he spent most of his time studying human nature. He currently lives in Florida with his wife and their two dogs, where he writes about creativity and pop culture at The Creative Life Adventure. His previous novels, Moral Compass and Paradise West, are available from most retailers and web sites, and his novella for young readers, Buddy and Thomas is available in digital format.

www.thecreativelifeadventure.com