A Shadow of Death in The Woods (25 page)

Chapter 42

The Teacher

I found the teacher’s home easily. It was a second floor walk-up in a decent but not expensive neighborhood. Her name was Ms. Henson, unmarried. I negotiated the stairs and rang the doorbell.

She lived alone and rarely had visitors at night. The doorbell surprised her when it rang. She wondered who it could be and worried that it could be trouble. She stepped to the door and looked through the peephole. All she could see was something that might be a man’s shirt. There was no face. It was strange.

I could hear someone come to the door but it didn’t open. I waited and finally heard, “Who is there?”

“My name is Jack Clayton, Will Clayton’s father. I am assisting in the search for him. I assume you know he is missing.”

“Do you have some kind of identification?”

“Yes, if you will open your door just a crack, I will slide my driver’s license in.”

The door opened against a security chain and I slid my license in. I didn’t want to burst her bubble but the security chain was a joke. I could rip the chain off the door or out of the jamb whichever was the weakest in about three seconds. It was just a passing thought. I had no intention of opening her door violently. I waited for a verdict.

Shortly, I heard a thank you and the door closed while she took the chain off. She opened the door and gave my license back to me.

She was awestruck. No wonder she couldn’t see anyone in the door peephole. There was a giant standing at her door. He filled the whole doorway. The peephole looked at his chest. His head was about the same height as the top of her door. His size took her breath away. She finally realized that she was standing there probably with her mouth open and said, “I am sorry about being so cautious. I couldn’t see your face in the peephole.”

“That’s fine. No apology necessary. You did the right thing. You should be cautious. I am sorry that I am a freak of nature. Some people find me intimidating but I don’t mean to be.

“Anyway, I am wondering if you would be willing to answer some questions. I am sure that the police have asked you lots of questions but you understand how anxious we are to find Will.”

“Yes, of course. It is no problem. I am so sorry to hear he is missing. He is such a nice little boy. A policeman did ask me some questions. And I am sorry about making you uncomfortable. I don’t think you are a freak of nature. It is just that I couldn’t see a face in the peephole.”

I asked if I could come in. She agreed. I entered a nice one-bedroom apartment and sat where she indicated.

She saw him duck his head as he came through the doorway. His shoulders filled the doorway. She had never seen a man this large in person. His arms were as thick as her legs. He was huge but he had a nice smile on his face.

“You made it sound as if the police haven’t asked you a lot of questions.”

“Well, there was the one policeman who came by and asked some questions.”

“Was he in uniform or plain clothes? Do you know his name?”

“He was in plain clothes and I don’t remember his name. Sorry.”

“That’s okay. It is part of the record and I can find out if needed. Tell me, what did he ask?”

“He just wanted to know what time Will left school.”

It sounded thin to me. I decided to start with the fundamentals and asked, “Was Will in school the day he disappeared??

“Yes. He was in school all day.”

“You remember that for sure? He was there all day Monday?”

“Oh, yes. I remember for sure.”

“Did he act normally? Did he seem upset about anything or say anything that might indicate he was thinking about running away or anything like that?”

“No. He acted normally and didn’t say anything unusual. It was just a typical Monday.”

“Do you remember what he was wearing?”

“No, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t notice him. I have twenty-five students. Besides, you are his father, don’t you know what he was wearing?”

“Well, the fact is his mother and I are divorced so I didn’t see Will on Monday. Of course his mother knows what he was wearing. I was just crosschecking since people are so upset they may not remember things well.

“What time did Will leave school on Monday, the day he disappeared?”

“I saw him leave at 3:30 p.m., which is the normal time. The students leave through the east door if they take a bus or ride with one of their parents. If they walk like Will does, they leave through the front door. I partner with another teacher who watches to make sure all the kids get on a bus or into a car at the east door. I take the students who are going to walk out the front door. I remember seeing Will walk up the street. I was watching because Will always lags behind. He daydreams a lot and he doesn’t keep up with the other kids walking. He is a smart boy but he is a daydreamer. And before you ask, everything appeared to be normal as he started up the street.”

I was struck by her detailed memory. It sounded as if Will left school all right and at the normal time. It all seemed normal if she wasn’t lying and I couldn’t see why she would be lying. I didn’t see much value in asking her more questions. I had gotten what I came for but it felt disappointing. I guess it would have been nice if she could have said that she saw him get in a car and she had the license number of the car or something. As it was, Will left school and simply disappeared between school and his home.

I got up to leave and thanked her. She again said that she was sorry to hear that Will was missing and said again that he was a nice little boy. I thanked her.

I was in a hurry to get back with the guys canvassing Will’s route home from school. I quickly made my way down the stairs and out to the car. In a minute I was driving back to Will’s street, hoping that the guys had found something. The sands of time were running out quickly for Will.

Chapter 43

The Route

I drove down Will’s street to the middle and parked since that was where we planned to end up. The street was just wide enough for parking on both sides and room for traffic to squeeze through. The people who lived here had garages and parking spaces behind their houses so there weren’t many cars parked on the street, only visitors’ cars.

Mike and Paul had started near Will’s house. Bob had started across from the school. I was assigned to start at the edge of the athletic field on the side of the school since that side had the fewest houses. We planned it this way since I was going to be gone for a while interviewing the teacher. I got out of the car and left it unlocked so the guys could get in and sit down if they wanted.

Another reason for my working the school end of the street was it kept me from having to knock on doors of people who I might know. They would want to chit chat and I didn’t have the time. Plus later they would want to blab to other people I knew and we wanted a low profile.

I saw both Mike and Paul working the street as I drove in. As I walked to my starting point I passed Bob across the street working his way toward Mike and Paul. I was behind and needed to hurry. We needed to keep to our schedule to get done this evening.

I started at the edge of the athletic field. I walked up the sidewalk made of flat, hand-shaped stone. You don’t see that in modern neighborhoods. It is too labor intensive and therefore too expensive. Now it is cheaper to pour concrete.

Overhead were arching maple trees. They were still mostly green although there were hints of changing color. They were mature trees but probably not real old; maybe they were planted during the depression. Beautiful trees. The only problem was when their roots lifted up the sidewalk slabs.

The weather was nice but chilly. I was glad I had on a light jacket. I had the steno notebook and pen Paul had supplied us. Ready for business.

I approached the first door and rang the doorbell. A man came to the door and I rattled off my spiel. He expressed his sympathy for Will being missing and stated he had not noticed anything out of the ordinary. He checked with his wife and she had not noticed anything unusual. I noted the address, what I had found and that there was no point in revisiting this house. I got back to the sidewalk, estimating that I was within my five minute allotted time. This was the drill. All I had to do was to keep it up and move toward Will’s house.

I moved to the next house and repeated. Nothing there either. I wondered if the other guys had found anything. Probably not or they would being doing something other than the canvassing. Somehow I was depressed. It was such a slim chance that anyone noticed if anything did happen to Will on the street. The only thing we had going for us was that it was apparent that Will disappeared on this street. He was seen going up this street and he never reached home. He either wandered off or he was kidnapped. Probably I should stop thinking and just canvass houses as fast as I could.

Next house. Just as I was approaching the house my phone rang. I took it out and saw that it was Bob. I answered, “Hey, Bob, what’s up?”

“I got a hit. I found a man who saw a suspicious vehicle. I want you to come over to see if you know the guy and to listen to him. It sounds like some good intel.”

I was greatly surprised. I had just been moping and thinking this was a waste of time and now a hit. In spite of my skepticism my heart was pounding. I crossed the street and walked up the few houses to where Bob was. I tried to keep my emotions under control. This would most likely turn out to be a false hit. It could be a crackpot, looking for attention or it might be an old person who couldn’t see well or a hundred other things that would only waste our time.

I came up to the address where Bob said he was. I rang the doorbell and a man answered the door almost immediately. I remembered seeing the man before but I didn’t know his name. I introduced myself and he said his name was Robert Thompson. He invited me in. He seemed slightly excited. That wasn’t necessarily good. He might be an old guy bored and wanting some attention.

I followed him into an old, expensive and well-appointed house. All the houses on this street were old but they were great houses built back when labor was much cheaper. A lot of material and hand labor went into these houses. All the houses were large, two or three story homes. This house had been kept up nicely. It was beautiful inside as well as outside.

Just inside the front door was a solid cherry table with a beautiful finish on it. It was an antique and in perfect condition. I love wood and this was beautiful wood. It was solid and not the veneer that you find nowadays. It reminded me of the table I made for Kat.

We went into a spacious living room where Bob was seated, talking on his phone. Shortly he got off the phone and he reviewed what Mr. Thompson had said.

In short, Mr. Thompson said that he had seen a car sitting on the street near his house a few days before Will disappeared. Mr. Thompson was a retired business man so he was around the house during the day. He said he noticed the car with two guys sitting in it and thought it suspicious. He was alert to guys casing houses for robbery.

Mr. Thompson was a man accustomed to be in charge. He had operated his own business when he was younger. He was the kind of man who didn’t easily take no for an answer. True to character he confronted the guys in the car. It would have been a better idea to phone the police but being a take-charge guy, he decided to take care of it himself.

He thought that the car was a Honda Civic, tan or light brown in color with no distinguishing marks on it. No dents or rust. Of course being a Japanese car it was impossible to tell the year.

Mr. Thompson approached the car from the passenger side. The man in the passenger seat was a large man. The driver was smaller. Both were white men. The large man was older than the driver. The driver had dark hair. The passenger was mostly bald on top and his fringe hair was dark and peppered with gray. The large man was confident, a little surly and did all of the talking. The driver seemed very nervous.

It was not a friendly encounter. It gave Mr. Thompson a bad feeling so he memorized the license plate number and later wrote it down.

I couldn’t believe that a person would have the presence of mind to note the license plate number. Very few people would have done this.

At this point Mr. Thompson became agitated. He said that he called the police to report the vehicle. Since the car had left, the police said not to worry about it. When Will came up missing, Mr. Thompson phoned the detective in charge of investigating Will’s disappearance. The detective told him that they had checked out the license plate and it was nothing to worry about. He felt the detective was dismissive and he was blown off by the detective.

I thought that this was interesting. I was taken by how upset Mr. Thompson was and he wasn’t the kind to get upset over nothing. I asked Mr. Thompson the detective’s name and he said Peterson. I made a note in my notebook in case it became important. We didn’t want to get sidetracked at the moment but depending on how things turned out it might be interesting to talk with the detective.

Bob then informed me that he had Mike Randall running the license plate. They should have the answer on that soon. Bob didn’t seem as excited about the plate number as I was.

Bob then asked Mr. Thompson if he could describe the men’s appearance for a police sketch artist and he said yes. Bob seemed to be very interested in that and he got on his phone.

I could hear him talking to Mike but I couldn’t make out all that he was saying. Shortly he hung up and said that Mike had gotten the results of running the plate number through the system. The plate turned out to belong to an eighty-year-old man in a town thirty miles north of the city. The plate belonged on an American car not Japanese. It had to have been a stolen plate, assuming that Mr. Thompson copied the number correctly and he probably did. He was the kind of in-charge guy who did things correctly. He seemed very detailed oriented.

Bob also said that Mike and Paul were almost done canvassing. Bob turned to Mr. Thompson and said, “We are sorry to be taking up so much of your time but I think you understand how important and how urgent this is and you are the first person with a possible clue.

“We have two other men helping to canvass Will’s route home on Monday. If you don’t mind, they will be here in a few minutes, and we want to make some arrangements to get a sketch done.” Mr. Thompson perked up at this. He was obviously pleased that someone was listening to him. He said, “You can stay as long as you want. I just hope this helps you find the boy. I don’t know what this world is coming to when a little boy can’t walk safely a few blocks home from school, especially in a neighborhood such as ours.”

Mrs. Thompson came in and announced that she had coffee and cake ready in the dining room. This was a welcome development since we were only waiting for Mike and Paul. I wondered aloud if I should go out and help them but Bob said no; they were almost done and would be here in a minute. I had phoned them earlier to tell them where I left off on my canvassing.

I felt guilty but the cake was delicious and the coffee hit the spot. I went off in a corner and called my ex-father-in-law for an update. They were still waiting for a contact from the kidnapper or kidnappers.

The doorbell rang. It was Mike and Paul. Bob made the introductions. Paul and Mike were fixed up with coffee and cake. Mike said that he had lined up a sketch artist trained in police sketching. It was a woman from Pittsburgh and Mike had already made arrangements for Bob’s plane to pick her up in the morning. She would be at the motel at eight in the morning if Mr. Thompson could be there at that time. A big grin spread across Mr. Thompson’s face. It was clear that he was thrilled to be able to help.

Mr. Thompson said that he would do it if we would stop calling him Mr. Thompson. He wanted to be called Robert. He said that he was never called Bob. Robert was his name.

Bob said that we were all set then. Mike made a couple of calls to ensure that the deal was on and arrangements to pick the artist up were confirmed.

I wondered out loud, “Why are we getting an artist from out of town? Surely they must have one nearby.”

Bob said, “Well, based on what Robert has told us, I don’t know if we can trust the local police to help. They might refuse or at a minimum create a big hassle. A big hassle means a loss of time, which we can’t afford. Usually police don’t want civilians ‘helping’ so the police would take it over and since they had already blown it off once, they would likely do the same again. Now that they suspected a kidnapping, the FBI might be more receptive but why take a chance? Besides Mike had worked with this woman before and she was excellent.

“There is a slight problem. If this turns out to be significant, the police might charge us with withholding information. Robert and his wife, under the circumstances, agreed to keep this just between us. The police need not know about what we are doing.

“The artist is an independent consultant and teaches at the university where Lydia teaches. In fact they know each other.”

That made a lot of sense to me. We would have a sketch or sketches tomorrow before noon and it would probably take longer than that just to talk with the police let alone get a sketch artist. And who knows maybe they didn’t have access to one. But surely the FBI would. They could arrange such a thing but I think Bob was right; it would be a huge hassle and maybe not successful. And most convincing was the fact that the police, local or FBI, would not want us involved. They would push us out and then maybe drop the whole thing. Better to keep it ourselves and run this lead down. Besides the police had the same access as we and they were days ahead of us.

We sat around for a little while enjoying the cake and coffee. The mood was upbeat and we were all anxious to check out this possible lead. Being realists we were cautiously optimistic. It was almost too good to be true to find a clue right away. On the other hand this is how you find clues, by getting out and looking.

I think we ate all of Mrs. Thompson’s cake. I made a note to get a cake delivered to their house, something special from my favorite bakery in town. I’d do that the next day.

This was not time to be worried about money. Finding Will at any cost was our priority. But being a CPA I couldn’t help estimating and adding up the costs. Plane flying here and there. Sketch artist flown in with no advance notice. This was going to cost me some money. Maybe I could get Bob to take a payback by reducing my pay. That way, in effect, I would be paying him back with pretax dollars. He would get his money and I would save money. It was slightly illegal in a technical sense because the IRS could argue that I received imputed income. Well, they wouldn’t be able to prove it and tough cookies for them. I felt guilty even thinking about money at a time like this but that is what CPAs do. And as far as the IRS went I didn’t feel guilty. These were the games we adults play.
I needed to stop thinking about this. Besides I was repeating myself.

We made our final arrangements with Robert. One of us would be around in the morning to pick him up at 7:30 and bring him to the motel by 8:00. We would meet in a conference room there with coffee, donuts and computer equipment. Paul had phoned the motel and made the arrangements. We seemed to be ready. We said our good evenings and left.

I was anxious to meet the lady artist. I could hardly wait until the next morning. I had seen sketch artists on TV but never in person.