The Train (8 page)

    The crowd surged forward, taking Mack and Lewis with them and leaving Hannah behind with Kerry and Jean Marie.

    "Mack!" Hannah cried, but he gave no sign that he'd heard her.

    As the crowd propelled Hannah forward, she re-alized she hadn't accepted Mack's story about getting lost. Lost? When all he had to do was go straight up the street to the doctor's office? No way. He wasn't telling the truth, she was sure of it.

    Why would Mack lie about where he'd been?

    She had to know.

    Taking a deep breath and extending her elbows on either side of her, Hannah pushed with all her might, creating a tiny space that allowed her to inch forward a little. She pushed again, and took another step. Mack and Lewis mounted the iron steps. She had to catch up to them.

    "Hannah, wait up'" Kerry called from behind, but Hannah kept going. Mack and Lewis had their heads together, like two people sharing a secret. What Mack was saying was important, she knew it. And he didn't want her to hear, she knew that, too. Or he would have told her back at the station. He wouldn't have let himself get swept up by the crowd.

    She tried to move closer, where she'd be able to overhear what he was telling Lewis. She was careful not to get too close - that was easy. All she had to do was mingle with the crowd heading from one car to the next. What wasn't so easy was inching her way toward Mack and Lewis. But she kept trying, and finally found herself separated from them by only one person, a small girl with a blonde ponytail.

    Mack and Lewis didn't turn around.

    By focusing her attention upon them, blocking out the rhythmic clackety-clack of the wheels, Hannah managed to make out what Mack was saying. "Why are you arguing?" he asked Lewis, "I told you, I know it sounds crazy. But I could have sworn…"

    The girl with the ponytail sneezed. Once. Twice. Three times.

    Hannah felt like screaming. She had missed hearing whatever Mack could have sworn.

    They entered a new car.

    "… me get this straight," Lewis was saying. "We came out of the restaurant and started for the doctor's office to meet Hannah and you thought you saw… what?"

    "Not what," Mack's voice replied clearly. "Who. I told you…" Hannah strained forward to hear.

    "Someone was coming out of the drugstore on the corner. There was something about the way he walked, the way he moved, his hair… I would have sworn…"

    Hannah held her breath. But she knew what Mack was going to say before he said it.

    "… I would have sworn it was Frog."

    

    

    

    Hannah would have fallen to the floor if Mack hadn't heard her sharp intake of breath and turned to see her wavering in the aisle. He lunged for her, catching her before she could fall.

    "You… saw… Frog?" she gasped, leaning into him.

    "Oh, gosh, Hannah, no, you thought… geez, I'm sorry. I didn't know you were listening." Kerry and Jean Marie arrived in time to hear Mack add, "I thought it was him, but of course it wasn't."

    "Who?" Kerry asked, seeing the look on Hannah's face. "Thought it was who?"

    "Frog," Hannah breathed. "Mack saw Frog."

    Kerry and Jean Marie gasped in unison even as Mack protested. "No! No, I didn't. How could I? This guy came out of the drugstore in town and he looked a lot like Frog. Dressed like him, too. Jeans and a plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled up, baseball cap. He looked so much like him, I lost my headand took off after him." Mack shook his head. "I don't know what I was thinking. I feel like a total jerk."

    "But you're not!" Hannah creed. "It was him! I know he's alive, I can feel it. I didn't say anything because I knew you'd all think I was crazy, but now that Mack's seen him - "

    "But I didn't!" Mack insisted. "That's just it. That's why I feel so foolish - "

    "Did you catch up with the guy? Did you talk to him?" Hannah asked feverishly. "Did you see his face?"

    Mack hesitated. "Well, no, but - "

    "Then it could have been Frog! I knew it, I just knew it!"

    "Hannah," Kerry warned, her eyes wide with bewilderment, "get a grip! What's wrong with you? Frog is dead. His coffin is right here on this train, remember?"

    Hannah pounced. "Yea, but he's not in it! No one is. I ought to know. I was in there! So don't tell me Frog is dead. Someone else must have died in that car crash and Frog let everybody think it was him."

    "Hannah," Jean Marie said softly, "that really doesn't make any sense. Why would Frog do that? If everyone thought he was dead, he'd never be able to show his face in town or at school, he couldn't go out or see people - why would someone do something so crazy?"

    "That's just it," Hannah answered, her eyes glit-tering with fear, "he is crazy! Don't you get it? He faked his own death so he'd be free to get even with all of us for the nasty things we did to him. He knew that no matter what happened to any of us, no one would suspect him because everyone thinks he's dead. It's perfect." Her eyes traveled from one face to the next. "Can't you see that?"

    Kerry shot a worried look at Mack. "But Hannah," she said, "you're the one who got locked in the coffin. And you're the only one who didn't have anything to confess in the Cafe. You're the only one who didn't do something terrible to Frog. So even if he is alive - and I don't think for one single second that he is - why would he hurt Hannah's cheeks blazed. "I have to get out of this awful hallway," she said quickly. "I can't breathe in here. Can we go back to our compartment, please? I'll feel safer there."

    No one said anything as they all hurried back to the compartment, but Hannah knew what they were thinking. Their thoughts circled around her head like vultures about to descend: Hannah's losing it, Hannah's one slice of bread short of a loaf, Hannah thinks a dead guy is alive and walking this train. Poor Hannah!

    Hannah bit down hard on her lower lip. She couldn't help how she felt, could she? She was the one who had been shut up in that horrible coffin, she was the one who knew better than anyone else that Frog wasn't in there. What was she supposed to think? That a dead person got out to make room for her?

    That idea was even crazier than what she was thinking!

    When they reached the compartment, she turned to face Mack. "So you ran after Frog," she said, biting off her words carefully. "That doesn't explain where you were all that time."

    Mack's face flushed as he opened the compartment door and let them all step inside ahead of him. "I… I told you, I feel -like a fool. What happened was, I ran after this… this person, whoever it was, and he went into a little wooden shed in one of the alleys. At least, I thought he did. But when I followed him inside, the place was empty. The door closed behind me and stuck… I tried to get out and couldn't. The hinge was all rusty… guess the place hadn't been used much. Some kind of storage shed, I think. Anyway, I pounded and yelled and pushed, but nothing worked. I was stuck in there."

    "Or locked in," Hannah said triumphantly. Her cheeks as flushed as Mack's, she turned to Kerry and said, "See? He was locked in that shed just like I was shut up inside the coffin. And I don't care what any of you say, it was Frog who did it'"

    "No, Hannah," Mack protested, "no, it wasn't. I told you, the door was stuck, not locked. I got out by breaking a window and I went around to the front and checked the door. It wasn't locked."

    "That doesn't mean it wasn't locked in the firstplace," Hannah persisted. "He could have unlocked it after a while. And you never got close enough to get a good look at the person you were following, did you?"

    "I didn't have to. I realized when I was in that shed that it was a crazy idea. We all know what happened to Frog."

    "We all know what we think happened to Frog." Hannah, her arms folded against her chest, stood firm in the middle of the small, wood-paneled room. "Exactly what Frog wanted us to think."

    Mack sighed heavily. "I give up. Think what you want to. Me, I'm going to check with that detective, see if he has any idea what's going on around here."

    "Me, too," Lewis agreed. "I'll go with you."

    When the compartment door had closed after them, Hannah turned to Kerry and Jean Marie and rolled her eyes heavenward. "They want me to admit that my theory is nuts," she said in exasperation, "and I just can't do that. I don't think it's nuts, do you?"

    Their faces told her they thought exactly that.

    Hannah's heart descended into her toes. She desperately wanted someone on her side.

    Maybe it was a crazy theory. How could Frog fool the whole town into thinking he was dead? Didn't medical examiners check out things like that?

    "Hannah," Kerry pointed out, "suppose, just suppose, you were right. Why would Frog hurt Lolly? She was the first one attacked, remember? But they were friends. More than friends. She was the only girl at school who would go out with him.So why would he try to strangle her?"

    "Well, I don't know about strangling, but they did have an awful fight," Jean Marie said.

    Hannah stared at her. "They did? Frog and Lolly?"

    "Well, she didn't call him Frog, Hannah. She called him Roger. Yeah, they did. Really nasty."

    "How do you know?"

    "I heard them. I mean, I wasn't eavesdropping, not on purpose. I was trying on jeans at The Gap, in the dressing room, and I heard these voices. I recognized Lolly's right away. She kept saying, `You're not going, are you? Are you, Roger? You can't go!' "

    Kerry looked interested. "Go where?"

    Jean Marie shrugged. "How should I know?"

    "What else did they say?" Hannah asked. Frog and Lolly had had a fight? She needed to know how bad the fight was.

    "She kept saying he couldn't go, and he kept saying he was going. Then she said she was sure it was a joke and he was stupid not to see that and he screamed at her not to call him stupid, and then the clerk came over and threw them out. Told them to take their argument outside. The last thing I heard was Lolly saying something like, `Then I'm going with you' and Frog saying `You're not, you'll ruin everything.' Then she said, `You're not going without me, Roger.' But their voices got too far away for me to hear the rest."

    Hannah sank down onto one of the seats. Jean Marie had just answered for her the question of why Frog would hurt Lolly. He'd been mad at her, maybe even as mad as he was at Hannah and her friends.

    "When was this?" she asked quietly, her eyes on Jean Marie.

    "Gosh, I don't remember, Hannah. I mean, why would I? It didn't matter to me." Jean Marie concentrated for a minute. "I think it was the Saturday before the trip. That morning."

    Hannah exhaled deeply. She knew what Lolly and Frog had been fighting about.

    That fight was her fault.

    "Hannah," Kerry said, "quit looking so glum. A fight doesn't mean anything. I'm always arguing with boys and so far, not one of them has wrapped a noose around my neck."

    "Not one of them was Frog," Hannah murmured stubbornly.

    "Look, this is silly." Kerry grabbed her purse. "Come on, Jean Marie, let's leave Hannah here to rest - nobody needs rest more than Hannah does. I'll walk you back to your compartment. Then I'm going to take a shower."

    "We're not supposed to go anywhere alone," Hannah reminded Kerry, alarm in her voice. "We promised Ms. Quick."

    Kerry sighed in annoyance. "You're right. I forgot. Okay, then, Jean Marie needs a shower, too, don't you, Jean Marie?" Without waiting for an answer, she tugged at Jean Marie's sweater sleeve. "C'mon, we'll both take a shower. You rest, Hannah. I know you're nervous, so lock the door after us and, when we come back, I'll knock twice, then three times so you'll know it's me. Okay?"

    Hannah nodded reluctantly.

    Kerry collected her cosmetic case and towel, and then she and Jean Marie left the compartment.

    

    

    

    Hannah stood alone in the center of the small room, wishing briefly that she'd gone with them. But she was too worn-out to take a shower. Kerry was right: who needed rest more than Hannah Deaton?

    She locked the door to the compartment. She would stay here, safe and sound, until Kerry and Jean Marie came back. She would rest, as promised.

    The knock on the door as she was about to pull down the window shade wasn't Kerry's. No tworap, three-rap deal, as Kerry had promised. It was an ordinary knock.

    Backing away from the door, Hannah cried, "Who's there?"

    "It's Ms.. Quick, Hannah. I have the detective with me. He'd like to speak with you if you're feeling up to it."

    Hannah let them in.

    "I know it's hard to believe right now," Ms. Quick said, "but I actually have good news. I've received word that Lolly arrived home safely. Her parents were distraught, of course. Can't blame them. Now, if I can only get the rest of you to San Francisco intact… Hannah, this is Detective Teach. He has been assigned to help us. Please try to answer any questions he might have."

    But, Hannah thought in silent protest, I'm the one with all the questions. Maybe this detective can give me some answers.

    The man was short and balding and dressed in a neat brown suit and brown shirt, holding a round brown hat in his hands, which, Hannah noticed, were also brown: tanned and freckled. His brown shoes were shined to a high gloss. He didn't look anything like the detectives she'd seen on television.

    As long as he could answer her questions, she didn't care what he looked like.