“Believe me now?” Sheriff Carmichael asked.
He and Special Agent Mandalay were standing at the back of his patrol car on the parking lot of Holly-Oak. The visit with Merrie had produced nothing in the way of information, but it most certainly swelled with an overabundance of heartbreak.
“Yes,” Constance replied, nodding. “It’s not that I didn’t believe you before. I just…”
“…had to do your job,” he finished for her as he slipped a key into the trunk lock and gave it a twist. It let out a dull thump as the latch released, almost as if underscoring his added comment, “I know.”
“Speaking of jobs, ever have one of those days when you really hate yours, Skip?” she asked. “Because I’m having one right now.”
“December twenty-second through twenty-fifth, every damn year,” he sighed, then repeated in a quiet mumble, “Every blessed, goddamned year…” With that, he lifted the trunk lid, extracting the key from the lock as it rose, then offered the jangling ring to Constance. “Here. No need in you standin’ out here in the cold. You might want to start it up and get the heater going. I’ll just be a few minutes. I need to take this stuff in.”
Mandalay glanced into the well of the trunk space and saw three large shopping bags, each with festively wrapped presents protruding from their depths. “I thought you weren’t big on celebrating Christmas here in Hulis,” she asked.
“These are all for Merrie,” he told her. “The new shoes she’s expecting. Some clothes. Mavis Crawford does sewing out of her house, so she makes things for her. And, a few other odds and ends. Whenever anyone travels or goes into the city, they hit those vintage resale stores and pick up old records and such. Things like that. We all carry a list in our wallets of what needs to be under the tree. Of course, most of us have it committed to memory by now.”
“I was actually planning to ask you about that,” Constance mused. “Why are all her clothes and belongings mired in the past?”
“It keeps her happy,” the sheriff responded.
“But is it healthy?” she pressed.
He shook his head as he gathered the bags and hefted them out of the trunk. “I suspect it’s as healthy as it can get. Merrie doesn’t cope very well with change, I’m afraid.”
Since his hands were full, Constance reached up and levered the trunk lid shut for him as she asked, “How so?”
Sheriff Carmichael huffed out a heavy sigh then grimaced noticeably. “Merrie Frances Callahan lives her life in a year long continuous loop, Constance. For her, it’s always nineteen seventy-five. That never changes. And, if you try to take her out of her little world, she just shuts down. That’s what I was trying to tell you when we were inside.”
“Shuts down?” she repeated. “Mentally, you mean?”
“And physically,” he said, punctuating the statement with an animated nod. “Last time a doctor tried to force her into the here and now, she almost died. She reverted to a catatonic state, was hooked to a feeding tube, and was just wasting away. That was right around ten or twelve years before Tom and Elizabeth died in that wreck, give or take. I was still playing detective in Kansas City back then.
“I do remember that they were actually expecting her to go at any moment. They’d already resigned themselves to it. Made funeral arrangements and everything. She was literally that bad off. It was gettin’ close to Christmas, and Elizabeth was a sentimental sort, so she got out all of Merrie’s old things and re-decorated her room back to how it originally was.” He shrugged. “Then, like some kind of damn miracle, she got better. Well…as better as she could, I guess. For most of the time, anyway.”
There was a pained sadness in the last comment, and Constance picked up on it instantly. “What do you mean by most of the time?”
“It gets a little rough this time of year. You heard what she said about Santa Claus.”
Constance nodded. “Repressed memories.”
“Something like that,” he replied. “Probably worse.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning they might not stay repressed.”
“Are you saying she actually relives the abduction and abuse?”
“We’d like to hope not,” he said then nodded. “But, unfortunately, in her head, we think she does, yeah.”
“You think she does?”
He thrust his chin toward her. “What time is it?”
Constance furrowed her brow in confusion at his query but pushed up the cuff of her glove and glanced at her watch anyway. “Two thirty-eight. Why?”
He bobbed his head toward the building. “In a couple of hours it’ll be right about the time Merrie was abducted thirty-five years ago. All of a sudden, just like someone flipped a switch, the girl who just painted your nails will go catatonic. She won’t snap out of it till about five on Christmas morning. Happens every year. After that, it’s like her clock is reset.”
“So that’s what Martha meant earlier about keeping an eye on the time.”
“Yeah,” he nodded. “That’s what she meant. When Merrie wakes up it will be pretty much like nothing ever happened. For her, it will be Christmas Day, nineteen seventy-four, which in her mind was the last time the holiday was ever good to her. We even have a tape of the ball dropping in Times Square, New Year’s Eve, to ring in seventy-five. She stays up to watch it every year.”
“What about other things? Like school and such? People aging around her? Not having any other children to play with? Surely she can see that things have changed.”
He shrugged. “Doesn’t seem to matter. She focuses on the Christmas holidays. Those are important to her. The rest of it seems to play itself out in her head as long as nobody interferes and she has her room.”
“But there are other physical issues. She’s a grown woman. What about menstruation? Arousal?”
He nodded. “She knows how to handle the monthly thing. Her mother was still around when that started. As to any sort of desires and such, to my knowledge she’s never exhibited any other than a crush on a teen idol from the day. No matter what her body does, in her head she’s ten. She doesn’t know any better than to think that’s just how it’s supposed to be. And… Well, we don’t really know what she sees when she looks in the mirror.”
Constance turned and stared toward the building as she breathed, “Dear God…”
“Sweetheart, in my way of thinking, God doesn’t have much of anything to do with it,” Carmichael spat. “If he does, then he’s just as big a sonofabitch as Colson was, and I’ll tell him that to his face when I get to the gates… As you can imagine, the preacher and me don’t much see eye to eye on that issue.” He paused for a second, looking at the ground thoughtfully, then hefted the bags once again and turned to go. “Let me get this stuff inside, so Merrie has her presents to open Christmas morning. It’d break my heart to disappoint her, and the past seven years I’ve been too busy to deliver ‘em when she wakes up. When I missed the first couple it caused some problems for her.”
“I understand,” Constance replied. As he started to walk toward the door, she called after him. “When you’re finished with that, do you think you can take me by the scene? I’d like to have a look at it.”
He stopped, half turned, looked up into the sky and then back down at her face. “Not really much daylight left,” he grunted. “No electric over there, and it’s boarded up, so it’s gonna be dark enough as it is. Be better if we did it tomorrow morning. Believe me, I’ve been down this road before. Nothing’s gonna show up there till Christmas Day anyway. But it’s really up to you. You’re the Fed.”
Constance thought about it for a moment. “Do you already have the house under surveillance?”
“Yep. Broderick should be out there now. Slozar’ll relieve ‘im this evening. We can drive by and check on them if you want.”
Truth is, he was correct. That visit could wait. As far as all of the previous murders went, the site was cold in almost every way imaginable. And this year, as a crime scene, it technically didn’t yet exist. She wasn’t going to learn anything stumbling around in the dark with a flashlight that wouldn’t be there for her to discover tomorrow morning.
And besides, at this point her feet really were killing her.
She nodded in agreement. “Okay, tomorrow morning then. I would feel better if we checked on the surveillance though.”
“We can do that. I assume you’re staying in town tonight?”
“I booked a room at the Greenleaf Motel, yes.”
“Good. We’ll swing by to check on Broderick, then we can suss out a time for me to pick you up in the morning. Just do yourself a favor tomorrow…”
“What’s that?”
He dipped his head toward her feet as if he’d read her mind. “Since we’re going out to do serious police work, wear a different pair of shoes. I’m a little tired of watchin’ you dance.”
“HARRY, this is Special Agent Mandalay,” Sheriff Carmichael said. He jerked a thumb toward Constance while pressing himself a bit deeper into the driver’s seat to allow for a slightly more unobstructed view. “Special Agent Mandalay, meet Deputy Harry Broderick.”
Skip had pulled up so that his driver’s side window was matched up against that of the deputy’s cruiser. Therefore, the two simply nodded at one another across the span in between.
“So… Anything?” Skip asked.
“Same ol’, same ol’,” Broderick replied.
He grunted in reply, “Yeah, figured as much.” He looked over to the passenger seat and addressed Constance. “There ya’ go. Harry’s on the job. Nothing to report, just like always. Ready to head back?”
She glanced at her watch. The package delivery and drive over here had taken a little longer than expected, but it was still only now approaching 3:30. She glanced out the window then back at the sheriff. “Actually I think maybe I’d like to get out and have a look around, if you don’t mind.”
He raised an eyebrow and nodded. “Change your mind about waiting till in the morning?”
By way of an answer she said, “It’s still light out…”
“Your call,” he replied, an audible shrug in his voice as he shifted the vehicle into gear and started it rolling forward. “Just let me get us out of the middle of the street first.”
Once they were parked, Constance unbuckled and climbed out of the patrol car. After swinging the door shut, she simply stood there for a moment, looking at the property over the top of the vehicle.
The house at 632 Evergreen Lane on the north side of Hulis Township was a simple one and one-half story bungalow, sitting on what appeared to be an average-sized lot. However, while there were other houses lining the street itself, none of them were what you could consider nearby. In fact, the closest in proximity was at best a football field away. On top of that, the undeveloped lots that made up that distance between them were to the heavy side of moderately wooded with stands of conifers. The arrangement effectively left number 632 to occupy its own private corner of the world.
“From the looks of the trees I suppose it has always been this secluded,” Constance observed aloud as Skip levered his door shut.
“Yeah,” he replied, leaning to the side and looking around the light bar at her. “Looked pretty much the same in seventy-five. It was a different color, but…well… This place has been boarded up more than once over the years.”
“Secluded and abandoned. That would explain why Colson chose it to hole up.”
“Yeah, that’s what we thought too. Just don’t know why we didn’t find them here on the first pass…” Skip sighed heavily then cleared his throat. “Back when I was a kid, old man Henderson lived here. Died here too. After that we used to think the place was haunted.” He glanced over his shoulder, gazing at the structure for a good while, then added. “Who knows? Maybe now it really is.”
“I’d like to think there’s a mundane explanation for what’s been happening,” Constance replied.
Skip gave a quiet snort, then nodded and said, “I’d be much obliged if you could find one.”
Sunset was still a little over an hour away, but the cloud cover that had been looming over the town all day was still firmly in place. What little daylight they had left was being consumed by the ravenous shadows from the surrounding wooded lots. Whether it was the clouds, the shadows, or something else entirely, to Constance it simply didn’t seem as “light” out here as it had just a scant few minutes earlier. The muted patina made her feel unnaturally chilled.
She continued to stare across the top of the police cruiser, silently taking in the tableau. In stark contrast to the green-needled conifers on either side of the property, a bare-branched pin oak tree was rising out of the front yard. It was malformed, probably due to some sort of damaging wind or storm that had sheared off the weaker branches at one time or another in its history. Though dormant now, she imagined that when its foliage was full during summer, it likely had an abundance of character and provided a refreshing shade. However, at the moment there was nothing inviting about the tree. In fact, it looked to her like a spindly, tortured soul trying to escape a forgotten grave, the headstone for which was the house itself.
The state of disrepair on the structure was evident. The once white paint on the aged clapboard siding was filthy, stained, and dull. Large areas were peeling away to reveal a coat of slate blue beneath, some of which was peeling as well. Along the left front corner, the gutter had separated from the fascia and was hanging several inches below the edge of the roof. The downspout was bent and cocked outward, but still secured to the side of the house. It appeared to be the only thing keeping the trough from crashing to the ground.
Plywood covered the windows on either side of the front door. Before affixing them, someone had actually taken the time to cut the sheets to fit the top arc so that they would be flush against the trim. However, combined with the weathering and fading light, that care in craftsmanship made the boarded up windows appear as a pair of dead eyes, rolling upward into the half story.
Hair prickled along the back of Constance’s neck. The tingling sensation continued the length of her spine as a low moan began to rise in her ears. Her breath caught in her throat and she tensed. In a movement born of pure reflex she hooked her thumb and slid her arm back, smoothly shifting her coat out of the way and brushing her hand against the grip of her Sig Sauer. A heartbeat behind the forlorn sound, its source was revealed when an icy lick of wind caught her hair and whipped it around, stinging as it slapped against her weather-reddened cheeks.
Halfway through closing her fingers on the sidearm she realized what she was doing, and Constance allowed her hand to loosen, then slide slowly back down to her side. She cast a furtive glance around and allowed herself to breathe. The deputy was still in his vehicle and the sheriff had his back to her. Fortunately, it appeared that her moment of weakness had gone unnoticed. The last thing she needed was to look like a wimp in front of them.
“Damn,” Skip muttered.
Constance focused on him as he turned back toward the car. “What’s wrong?”
“I think these batteries are dead,” he complained, hammering the butt of a multi-cell flashlight against the heel of his hand, then clicking the button repeatedly. He frowned at the unlit business end of the torch and huffed, “Weird. I just changed them last week… Well…hang on. Let me borrow Broderick’s.”
The sheriff turned and started toward the other vehicle, but Constance interrupted before he had taken three steps. “That’s okay. We can just do this tomorrow.”
Skip stopped and looked back over the car at her. A curious expression applied itself to his face and he said. “You sure?”
“Yes,” she replied, glancing up at the sky then back down to his face. The wind was still rising and falling, so she reached up and brushed a wayward shock of hair out of her eyes then gave him a thin smile. “Like you were saying, not much daylight left, and we won’t find anything tonight that won’t still be there in the morning.” She shrugged. “Besides, maybe your flashlight being dead is a sign.”
He snorted out a half chuckle. “Yeah… Okay…”
“Trust me, Skip,” she offered. “I’ve seen stranger things.”
He looked at the flashlight, then cocked an eyebrow and regarded her quietly for a handful of seconds. Finally he said, “I’m not sure I even want to know.”
She nodded. “You’re right. You probably don’t.”
The chill dancing along Constance’s spine didn’t really subside until they were almost back to the sheriff’s office near the center of town. As she struggled to shake it off, she didn’t know whether she should be disturbed, embarrassed, or both.