“Well,” the operator said, “you got JFK and LaGuardia a cab ride or subway trip away…”
“No good, my family won’t pay for the airline tickets. What are the cheap ways if you need to go a long distance off campus?”
“There’s plenty of buses, trains. You got Port Authority and Penn Station…”
“Anything else?”
“Well, if you’re going cheap, there’re the student shuttles.”
“Student shuttles.” A bell went off in the Ringer’s head. “If I wanted to learn more, maybe talk to a student about these shuttles, how would I do that?”
“One moment, let me transfer you to someone who can help.”
As he waited for the call to go through, the Ringer penciled three schools down on his list: Columbia, which was doubtful. Small chance Parker would hang around uptown, waiting to be snatched by a black-and-white. Hunter and NYU had higher probabilities. And both were right off the 6 train.
Finally he was connected to the Office of Student Services. Under the guise of Lennie Hardwick, sophomore and racked for time, he persuaded a very nice lady named Helen to check the student shuttle postings for him. One match came up, a junior named Wilbur Hewes who was driving home to Ontario at 11:00 a.m. this morning. No other rides were registered for today. Hitching a ride to Canada made sense-assuming Parker didn’t get stopped at the border. The Ringer wrote down Hewes’s name and asked for the phone number on the posting. Lennie figured he’d keep it in case he ever wanted to do some fishing up north.
The Ringer called Wilbur Hewes’s cell phone, got a curt response on the third ring.
“Yeah?”
“Hello, is this Wilbur?”
“Yeah, what?” The Ringer could hear the rush of the highway, Wilbur’s voice full of static. Horns blaring. Heavy metal music loud enough to make his eardrums throb. The Ringer smiled. Wilbur was stuck in traffic.
“Hi, Wilbur, my name is Oliver Parker. I’m calling from Montreal, and I was informed by the helpful operator at Columbia that my son Henry might have gotten a ride from you.”
“No Henry here. Nobody responded to my posting.”
“Really?” the Ringer said, crossing Columbia off the list. “You sure he didn’t tell you to keep it a secret? It’s my birthday today, maybe he wanted to surprise me and show up unannounced?”
“Listen, man,” Wilbur said. The Ringer could hear the agitation of bumper-to-bumper traffic getting to Wilbur. “Nobody called about a ride. Unless your son’s hiding in my trunk, wedged between three big-ass suitcases, he’s not with me. All right?”
“Absolutely. I’m sorry to bother you.” Wilbur hung up.
After a quick call to Hunter, he learned the school did not offer such a service, at least not one that was officially sanctioned. In other words, without a contact at the school, he was out of luck. He crossed Hunter off the list.
He phoned NYU and was connected to the Office of Student Activities.
The OSA receptionist, a bitter-sounding battle-ax of a woman, said she wasn’t allowed to offer the listings over the phone. He asked her for the address and hung up.
Traffic moved like oil through a funnel, slow and thick. He double-parked in front of the OSA and, inside, a helpful custodian directed him to the postings. Halfway down the light blue hallway, the Ringer found what he was looking for.
The portly woman seated behind a pane of glass was clearly the same person who’d refused to read him the listings over the phone. He offered a pleasant smile and picked up the listings. They were separated into two batches: red and blue. He licked his thumb and sifted through them. No dice. No cars were scheduled to leave until later in the week.
He was about to cross NYU off his list when, on a whim, he walked up to the receptionist and pulled out Henry Parker’s photo, cropped from the newspaper. He gently rapped on the glass. The woman, a glamorous mole poking from her left nostril like a burrowing hedgehog, was buried in a celebrity magazine.
“Sorry to bother you,” the Ringer said. “I was supposed to drive my son home this morning, but I’m not sure he got the message and I’m worried he might have left without me. He’s about six feet tall, brown hair. He might have had a backpack of some sort with him.”
The woman squinted, crinkled her nose and leaned closer.
“Yeah, there was one kid in here like that. He was in some kind of big huff, too, not very patient.” The Ringer’s heart quickened. “You ask me, your kid needs some lessons in manners.”
The Ringer nodded. “First thing I’ll tell him. Do you know if he got a ride from a student?”
“He did take a slip from the board. I can’t tell you what he did with it.”
“Would you happen to know whose slip he removed?”
The woman looked less than eager to help.
“Please,” the Ringer added, his eyes imploring. “His aunt is sick, emphysema. I really need to find him.”
“Doesn’t your boy have a cell phone?”
The Ringer offered a sheepish look. “No, his sister at George Washington has the only one in our family.”
The woman sighed heavily, then punched some keys on the computer.
“We log in all registered student rides. I can check the ones that left this morning, if it’s really that urgent. If it’s that urgent.”
“Believe me, it is.”
The woman hit a few more keys, waited a moment, punched a few more, then came up with a name.
“Amanda Davies,” she said. “Left at nine this morning to St. Louis.”
“You know, I’d love to call Ms. Davies up, let my boy know everything’s all right. Did Miss Davies leave a phone number?” The woman nodded, scribbled on a Post-it and handed it through the small slot at the bottom of the window.
“Anything else?” she said, her eyes darting back to pictures of a couple cavorting topless on a white beach.
The Ringer shook his head. “No, you’ve been extremely helpful. Thank you.”
As he left the OSA, the Ringer dialed the operator.
“What city and state?”
“St. Louis, Missouri. I’d like the address and phone number for a Miss Amanda Davies.”
Five minutes later the Ringer had reserved a plane ticket and called an associate in St. Louis who could get him an un-traceable gun. Ten minutes later he was speeding to LaGuardia airport. Blood was in the water, and he would only be circling for so long before he was able to strike.
18
I was back in that hallway. The man was pointing his gun at me. His horrible, manic grin breaking through the darkness. His finger squeezed the trigger. There was a sharp report and I was blinded by the gun’s muzzle. He squeezed again. And again. But with each successive blast, rather than the slug ripping through my body, tearing my flesh, John Fredrickson would stagger back. And another gaping wound would appear in his chest.
He looked at the pistol, as if wondering what went wrong, then fired again, his body jolting backward like a puppet yanked by a spiteful master. Every bullet meant for me instead struck him, blood spurting from his chest.
Once the clip was empty, Fredrickson stared at the gun, his jacket and shirt in gory tatters. He silently mouthed what happened, before collapsing onto the floor. When I looked down, the gun was gone from his hand. Then it appeared in mine.
Wake up, Henry.
Then I was back in the car with Amanda.
I blinked the sleep from my eyes. It was a dream. My neck had gone stiff. Apparently I’d fallen asleep against the window. My face felt sticky. The sky was dark. The dashboard clock read 8:52 p.m. Amanda was sipping a fresh cup of coffee. An unopened cup sat in the holder.
“I got you one, just in case,” she said. “It’s probably cold by now, but I didn’t want to wake you.”
“Thanks, I could use it.” I pulled back the tab and took a sip. It was cold, and heavy on the milk and sugar. Amanda Davies clearly valued the little things in life.