“What do you know about him?” I asked.
“That he’s old enough to be her father,” said Alanis.
“No, grandfather!” said Carrie.
“And she thinks there’s something spiritual between her and him. Daley said that before she met him she felt like a puppet in the rain. That talking to him was like turning off the rain so she could turn into a girl instead of a puppet.”
“She actually said turn into a woman,” said Carrie.
Alanis swept aside her hair and cut her friend a look. Then back to me. “And know what else? Daley said this secret old man was the first person she’d ever met who didn’t make Jesus Christ seem funny.”
“Like a joke,” said Carrie. “Who didn’t make Jesus Christ seem like a joke.”
“Whatever. Why do you always miss my points?”
I said nothing for a moment. Watched Alanis Tervalua’s cyclopic stare collide with Carrie Calhoun’s wide green eyes.
“Sorry, Lana.”
“Always have to win.”
“I know. I just get excited.”
“So there you go again.”
“Sorry. I’ll be quiet.”
Thus, silence. Just the breeze in the coral tree leaves and the droning sound of a Cessna 182 lowering into Carlsbad Airport. I recognized the sound of that plane without even looking, the very plane in which Justine had met her terrifying, solitary, unnecessary end. This time I didn’t look up. Sometimes the throaty growl of that Lycoming engine brings joyful memories, and sometimes brute loss.
“Where is she, Mr. Ford?” asked Alanis.
“Two nights ago she was with Adam Revell, and Connor, and some others.”
“So she’s okay, then?” asked Alanis. “Is she going to go home soon?”
“I don’t think she’s okay,” I said. “We need to find her. Tell me about Adam and Connor.”
“We’re kind of friends,” said Carrie. “I mean, we all knew each other from Alchemy 101. Like we told you last week.”
“I was never kind of friends with those two,” said Alanis.
“But we haven’t been to Alchemy 101 much the last few weeks,” said Carrie. “There’s something kind of off about it. Daley thought so, too. But it’s hard to say what.”
“I can say what,” said Alanis. “They hate on you with their eyes.”
I stepped closer to what I thought was the deep end, touched my toe to the water. “Do you go to the Cathedral by the Sea?”
“Once,” said Alanis. “Same creep-out I got from Adam and Connor.”
“Twice,” said Carrie. “Both times with Daley.”
“Tell me about that.”
“Cool building. And — you know how churches are, everyone smiling and forgiving you ahead of time. For stuff you don’t even know you did. That cathedral has all these activities for teens. They want you at Surf Day and Snow Weekend and Mountain Camp, on and on.”
“But you’ve never done any of those?” I asked.
“Not my deal,” said Carrie.
“You were there twice with Daley?”
“She’s interested in activities because of her sister,” said Carrie. “Who’s even more stricter than my own mom. Taking away her Facebook and all that. I mean — you can’t ever say I told you — but Penelope locks Daley in her room sometimes. After nailing the window shut. I’ve seen the nails. And I’ve seen Daley’s foot marks on the door where she’s kicked it.”
“The more her sister wouldn’t let her do things, the more she felt trapped,” said Alanis. “So she’d hang out with Nick. And she’d sneak off to Alchemy 101 with Adam or Connor.”
I pictured Daley in all her teenage frustration, paying her five bucks, getting her hand stamped, and losing herself in Alchemy 101. Music, dancing, and plenty of other girls and boys to hang with. And I imagined her at the Cathedral by the Sea, being wooed by the youth minister — or maybe by Atlas himself, her own very, very secret father — hoping that her meddlesome sister wasn’t about to bust her.
“Did either of you ever meet the pastor, Reggie Atlas?”
“Once,” said Alanis. “He shook my hand with both of his. But I saw something in his eyes I didn’t trust.”
“Daley introduced me to him,” said Carrie. “He was nice and kind of reserved. Like older guys can be. I mean that as a compliment, you know?”
“So Daley knew him?” I asked.
Carrie pursed her lips, green eyes scanning my face. “Well, I guess at least sort of. She was the one who took me to the cathedral my first time. She’d been there before, but not often. We had to make up this double lie to her sister and my mom so Daley could get away that morning.”
“What was Daley’s opinion of the pastor?”
Alanis shrugged. “Never said anything to me.”
Carrie was nodding along. “Me neither. You don’t think he’s got something to do with Daley, do you?”
“No, I don’t.”
In my profession, I tell lies to get to the truth. People expect it and I don’t mind doing it. Except lying to the trusting. Trust is hard to betray. Ask anyone who’s hidden a diagnosis from a child, or cheated on a spouse, or had a faithful pet put down.
Maybe someday I could do better. Tell them not a lie but the truth: Hey — Daley is back now and she’s fine and she can’t wait to see you.
“How can we help you?” asked Alanis.
“Please let us help,” said Carrie.
I put one of my big mitts over one of each girl’s hands, small and warm as sparrows. I looked intently at them with my older-guy eyes in my older guy’s beat-up face. They looked back at me in their young, unique, and peculiar way, and they were afraid.
“Stay alert and together when you can,” I said. “Keep your eyes and ears open. Stay away from Adam, Connor, Alchemy 101, and the Cathedral by the Sea. Call me quickly if you see either of those men, or if something seems wrong. If anything is out of place.”
“It’s worse than we thought it was,” said Alanis.
“And we thought it was pretty bad,” said Carrie.
I waited with them in the Monarch Academy parking lot until Alanis’s father came to take them home.
Checked in with Burt again. Nothing unusual at Paradise Date Farm. Burt was worried that camera four had malfunctioned. “Hopefully it didn’t just drop off the wall and land in the barnyard,” he said.
Very hopefully, I said, and rang off.
I got some take-out from Thai Thai and took it to my office. Sat and ate while the air conditioner hummed, watching Main Street in the midday heat. Not much traffic. We don’t have much hustle-bustle in Fallbrook, except when school days start and end. Instead, we have classic cars, avocado orchards, and citrus groves. We have a terrific Christmas parade. And a nice 4-H show every year, if you want a lamb, a goat, a calf, or a pig. We have a handsome new library, a high school whose mascot is still a warrior in a feathered headdress, four bars, five tattoo parlors, just a few downtown traffic signals, one tennis club, thirty-eight churches, and a Christian Science Reading Room.
I thought back to a week ago, last Wednesday, when Penelope Rideout had walked into this office and begun her improbable tale. Enlisted me for her dangerous mission and sent me into the beating of my life. Puzzled, deceived, and angered me. Flirted and feinted and danced away. Into a private place of mine that had long been closed for repair. Years since anyone had come near it. But there she was.
I heard footsteps on the stairway, coming up. A figure arrived outside my door. A white shirt and a white hat, both pebbled by the glass.
He paused for just a moment, then stepped in and closed the door.
“Mr. Ford.”