The janitor slid behind the wheel. I crossed my fingers that he’d hang out for a while, maybe give Carlotta a chance to start lobbing oranges onto the van’s roof, but not today: quicker than you can say “Guadalupe!” we were on the road. The janitor drove north again, away from Siesta Corta.
I couldn’t see out, so I passed the time by staring at the toolbox. Although I’d closed the lid, I’d forgotten to latch it, and every time we hit a bump it threatened to fly open and dump its contents. Also, I’d left the padlock lying in plain view on the blanket; I kept waiting for the janitor to notice it in the rearview mirror and pull over to investigate.
After we’d gone about fifteen miles, he did pull over. I raised my head up as high as I dared, trying to get a sense of whether we were coming into a gas station or some other place where people would hear me if I screamed. It didn’t look like it. It looked like we were in another roadside turnaround.
The janitor set the parking brake and killed the engine. He didn’t get out. He rolled his window down, dug around in his pockets for a moment, and lit a joint.
Today I didn’t begrudge him. Let him smoke all the dope he wanted; as long as he didn’t come in back and kill me, I’d be totally cool with it.
I listened to the cars buzzing past on Route 99. Come on, Officer Friendly, I thought. Get your vice detector working… There was a lull in the traffic, and I heard a new sound: voices.
Voices approaching the van?
Voices off in the distance. Boys’ voices, shouting, excited, like in a playground. Then I heard a wooden crack! and I thought, ball field, and I thought, oh shit.
I really didn’t want to die, you know? But I didn’t think I could just sit quiet if the janitor started with the monkey noises again. If it came down to that, I thought I was probably going to have to bash him over the head with the toolbox.
But he kept his fly zipped. Maybe he was worried this spot was too public, or maybe he was storing up images for later. Whichever, he just sat and watched, and smoked—first the joint, then half a dozen cigarettes.
Finally he’d had enough, and got moving again. He drove another three or four miles up the highway before turning off on a side road. The road was in bad shape, and the toolbox lid started jumping again—and just to make things more exciting, we were going uphill, so the blanket kept sliding underneath me. I had to hook my hands under the bottom of the driver’s seat and hang on.
We made a last turn, onto gravel, and pulled into a garage. The janitor parked and got out. My adrenaline level spiked as he walked to the back of the van, but he continued around to the passenger’s side without stopping, jangling his keys. There was a hum of an electric motor as the garage door rattled shut, followed by more key jangling, and the squeak of another door opening and closing. And then, incredibly, I was alone. He hadn’t even come close to discovering me.
I crawled back to the toolbox and got the knife. I thought about taking everything, but I didn’t want to overload myself without knowing how far I might have to run. I figured the knife was the most important piece of evidence, not to mention the most useful if I happened to get cornered.
I got out of the van on the passenger’s side and looked for the button that activated the garage-door opener. I couldn’t find it, but on the wall right where you’d expect the button to be, I saw a small metal panel with a keyhole in it. I whipped out one of my paper clips and with a couple deft moves managed to break off the tip in the keyhole.
Shit. A quick check of the garage door confirmed that I’d need superstrength to open it by hand. I thought seriously about trying to crash the van through it, but it looked sturdy enough to withstand a collision, and anyway, my j.d. skill set didn’t extend to hot-wiring.
I was going to have to sneak out through the house. Worse, now that I’d jammed the garage-door opener, I was going to have to do it soon, before the janitor decided to go out to dinner or another Little League game.
I went and pressed my ear to the house door, and when I didn’t hear heavy breathing on the other side, I tried the knob. I expected it to be locked, which was going to create additional problems, but I guess the janitor wasn’t a total security fanatic after all. The knob turned, and I opened the door a sliver.
Water was running somewhere in the house. I opened the door wider, and the running-water noise resolved itself into the sound of a shower.
I couldn’t believe my luck. I didn’t believe it: as I slipped through the door, I held the knife at the ready.
I found myself in a little alcove equipped with a washer and dryer. The alcove opened into a kitchen. To my left as I came out of the alcove was another doorway; it led into a bedroom, which led, in turn, to the bathroom with the shower. I hovered at the bedroom doorway, listening.
The janitor was definitely in the shower stall; I’ll let you guess how I knew that. My nose wrinkled in disgust, but at the same time I relaxed, sure that I was safe now for at least the next few minutes.
Relief made me stupid. Instead of beating it for the front door, I started snooping around, opening drawers and cabinets. I was over by the pantry, trading glances with the Trix rabbit, when the phone on the kitchen table rang.
I reacted as if a burglar alarm had gone off. I dropped the knife in a panic, and snatched at the phone before it could ring a second time.
The shower kept on running. I raised the phone to my ear.
“Hello?” I said.
There was a pause, and a series of sharp clicks, and then a man’s voice said: “Jane Charlotte.”
It was the janitor, of course; he’d tricked me. All this time he’d been stringing me along, letting me think he hadn’t noticed me. The sounds in the shower stall must have been some sort of recording, meant to lull me into a false sense of security. The game was over now, though, and in a moment he’d tell me to turn around, and he’d be standing right behind me, and then I would die.
But what the voice on the phone said next was: “You don’t want to be messing around in there, Jane. He’s a bad monkey.”
Then the voice broke up in a screech of static—or maybe it was me who screeched—and the next clear thought I had I was outside, running screaming for the road.
Two state police cars were pulling up in front of the janitor’s house. Felipe’s pickup truck was right behind them, with Felipe, Carlotta, Señor Diaz, and the school librarian all jammed into the cab together.
A cop got out of the lead car, and I ran straight into his arms, shouting: “He’s the Angel of Death! He’s the Angel of Death! The janitor is the Angel of Death!” The cop grabbed me by the shoulders and tried to get me to tell him what had happened, but I just kept on shouting: “He’s the Angel of Death!”
The other cops drew their guns and advanced on the house. They were almost at the front door when the janitor came out, still damp from the shower, wearing a T-shirt and a pair of boxer shorts. I’d started to calm down a little, but when I saw him I lost it again, screaming “Bad monkey!” and scrambling around to the far side of the police cars.
The cops pointed their guns at the janitor and told him to put his hands up, and he did. He was smooth. Instead of looking scared he acted bewildered, like he was this totally innocent guy who couldn’t imagine what the police were doing on his property.
They handcuffed him. “Come on now,” the lead cop coaxed me. “It’s all right, we’ve got him. Talk to me.” So I started babbling about the hunting knife, and eventually he nodded and said, “OK, just stay here,” and went inside the house.
The Diazes formed a protective huddle around me. “Are you OK, Jane?” Carlotta said. “Did he hurt you?”