Read Let Me Whisper in Your Ear Online
Authors: Mary Jane Clark
Let Me Whisper in Your Ear
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Contents
St. Martin's Paperbacks Titles by Mary Jane Clark
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For my parents,
Doris Boland Behrends, who encouraged me to follow my dream of working in television news ⦠and
Fred “The Fed” Behrends, who, I hope, passed on some of his crime-solving genes.
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Thank you for taking me to Palisades Park.
Acknowledgments
T
HE VERY FIRST
story I was ever assigned to do at CBS News was an obituary on Rose Kennedy, assigned more than fifteen years before she actually died. I was so proud to be putting my first “piece” together that I didn't pay much attention to the friends and family who thought it gruesome that a story about someone's death was all assembled well before the subject heaved a final breath.
As the years passed, I updated Mrs. Kennedy's obit several times and worked on many others as well, playing the odds that old age or severe illness meant that someone would most likely die soon and we had better have a video life story ready to air. But a few times, I had someone's obit ready when no one really expected the person to die. I had done the stories on hunches ⦠feelings that paid off.
Out of those experiences comes this book.
To get from the idea to the book you now hold in your hands required the help of several knowledgeable people whom I would like to thank.
Accomplished musician Russ DeFilippis grew up down the block from the old Palisades Amusement Park. Russ regaled me with the colorful stories of his childhood and put me in touch with others from “the neighborhood.”
Sister Anne Donnelly generously shared her knowledge of Parkinson's disease, providing the details of how the condition manifests itself and what medication is used to treat it. Sister Anne, happily, was also my sixth-grade teacher and self-esteem builder. But let's blame any errors in sentence structure on her.
Katharine and Joe Hayden helped me when it came time to figure out the legal repercussions of the actions of one of my characters. It's not the first time Katharine and Joe have come to my rescue and, I suspect, it won't be the last.
Sgt. Ed Welch, newly retired New York City Police officer, helped with precinct information and descriptions of the crime scenes. With twenty-five years of NYPD experience under his belt, Ed can paint a vivid picture. I'd love to read his book, should he decide to write it.
Vince Gargiolo's book,
Palisades Park: A Century of Fond Memories,
along with the clippings file at the Cliffside Park Public Library, provided valuable research information on my favorite amusement park.
A new, and I hope continuing, source of inspiration came from Elizabeth Clark, my fifteen-year-old daughter. I was stumped over something and, over lunch one day, asked Elizabeth what she thought. She came up with a terrific solution to the problem I was having. Thank you, Monkey.
Gratitude to Jennifer Weis, my editor at St. Martin's Press, for the attention she gave this book. Jennifer has a keen sense of what makes a story work and her input helped make this one better. Copyeditor Dave Cole did his job carefully and well, finding, though I hate to admit it, a mistake or two along the way. Thank you so much, Dave. Sally Richardson, Matthew Shear, John Murphy, Matthew Baldacci, and Walter Halee are pulling for me as well. I'm aware of it and greatly appreciate it.
Once again, Laura Dail, my wonderful agent and valued friend, has encouraged me and done her job well. I wish for every writer an agent as devoted, smart, and hardworking as Laura. The bonus for me is that she has a great sense of fun as well. Francheska Farinacci, Laura's able and dear assistant, generously lent her distinctively spelled name for a character.
Finally, I would like to thank Father Paul Holmes. A constant source of encouragement, Paul has been there since the beginning of my dream. Over the years, when things looked pretty bleak, Paul's reassuring voice of reason pulled me up. His editorial skills are extraordinary and I am the extremely fortunate beneficiary of them. Grazie, Paolo.
Prologue
âª
Palisades Amusement Park â¦
Swings all day and after dark â¦
âª
T
HE TWO YOUNGSTERS
sneaked through the hole in the fence as so many others had done before them. That their parents didn't know where they were only increased their guilty pleasure.
Twelve years old and sneaking into Palisades at night.
How cool!
They had done it often enough during the day, when the amusement park was open for business. Just behind the Free Act Stage, there was a hole in the fence that circled the park. Lots of local kids knew about the opening and slipped through it so as to avoid paying the admission fee. Little did they know that the park's good-hearted owner was well aware of the hole but had instructed security guards to turn a blind eye to the young trespassers. He didn't want any child turned away from Palisades Park. And, after all, once inside, the interlopers would have to spend their money just like anyone else.
Sneaking in during the day was one thing. Sneaking in at night, after the park was closed, was another. But with school starting in a few days and the park closing for the winter, they could not wait any longer. If they were going to collect their payment from Emmett, this was the night to do it.
With only the light of the early-September moon to guide them, the children hurried down the darkened midway, eager to collect their reward. Past the boarded-up Balloon Game and Cat Game, past the closed birch beer and roast beef stands. Past the bingo parlor, where just hours before, men and women in their short-sleeved cotton shirts and summer frocks sat eagerly sliding red plastic discs across cardboard game sheets.
And then, there it was. The granddaddy of them all, the Cyclone. The world's largest, fastest, scariest roller coaster loomed before them, darkly sinister against the moonlit sky: their payoff for a season of running errands for Emmett.
The tip of a burning cigarette glowed in the dark, signaling that Emmett was waiting for them. As they drew closer, they saw that Emmett was not alone. That curvy brunette in her tight Wrangler shorts who had been hanging around him all summer was wrapped around him again tonight.
“Hey, squirts. You all set?”
They looked at one another and nodded apprehensively. What had seemed like such a great idea during the day, now, at night, took on a different cast. Their enthusiasm turned to excited fright. What would it feel like to ride the Cyclone, in the dark, all by themselves? Would they really be able to carry out their plan and follow through on the dare they had made to each other?
Neither one wanted to be the first to chicken out, so they climbed into the first white wooden car of the roller coaster. They took their seats side by side, and their hands gripped the metal guard bar. Their hearts pounded against their chest walls as the car slowly pulled out from its starting place; the metallic clanking of the pulling chain echoed eerily in the late-summer night.
Excruciatingly slowly, they made their ascent, high above the Palisades. The New York City skyline glimmered beneath them as they crept inexorably to the Cyclone's summit.
What exactly happened after that would take decades to discover. But when the ride came to an end, the car pulled into the station carrying only one child.
The Holiday Season