Magic hour: a novel Page 3

“After the thunder crack, the rain stopped. Just like that. One minute it was pourin’, and then it wasn’t. Then that amazin’ sun came out. That’s when old Doc Fischer heard a wolf howl.”

  Peanut shivered. “It’s like that time on Buffy when she—”

  “Keep going, Earl,” Ellie said sharply.

  “It was Mrs. Grimm who noticed the girl. I was getting my hair cut—and don’t say ‘What hair?’” He turned slowly and pointed. “When she climbed up that there tree, we called you.”

  Ellie stared at the tree. She’d seen it every day of her life, had played in it as a kid, stood beside it to smoke bummed menthol cigarettes as a teenager, and gotten her first kiss—from Cal, no less—beneath its green canopy. She didn’t see a damn thing out of the ordinary now. “Is this some kind of joke, Earl?”

  “Holy Mother o’ God. Put your glasses on, El.”

  Ellie reached into her breast pocket and retrieved the over-the-counter glasses she still didn’t admit to needing. They felt alien and heavy on her face. Squinting through the oval lenses, she stepped forward. “Is that. . . ?”

  “Yes,” Peanut said.

  There was a child hidden high in the autumn-colored leaves of the maple tree. How could anyone climb that high on rain-slicked branches?

  “How do you know it’s a girl?” Cal whispered to Earl.

  “All’s I know is it’s wearing a dress and has long hair. I’m makin’ one of them education guesses.”

  Ellie took a step forward to see better.

  The child was little, probably no more than five or six. Even from this distance, Ellie could see how spindly and thin she was. Her long dark hair was a filthy mat, filled with leaves and debris. Tucked in her arms was a snarling puppy.

  Ellie reholstered her gun. “Stay here.” She started forward then stopped and glanced back at Peanut and Cal. “I mean it, you two. Don’t make me shoot you.”

  “I’m glue,” Peanut said.

  “Superglue,” Cal agreed.

  Ellie could hear a flurry of whispering as she strode through the four-way stop. As she neared her destination, she took her glasses off. She hadn’t come to the point where she trusted the world as seen through a lens.

  About five feet from the tree she looked up. The child was still there, curled on an impossibly high branch. Definitely a girl. She appeared completely at ease on her perch, with the pup in her arms, but her eyes were wide. She was watching every move. The poor kid was terrified.

  And damn if that wasn’t a wolf pup in her arms.

  “Hey, little one,” Ellie said in a soothing voice. It was one of the many times she wished she’d had children. A mother’s voice would be good right about now. “What are you doing up there?”

  The wolf snarled and bared its teeth.

  Ellie’s gaze locked on the child’s. “I won’t hurt you. Honestly.”

  There was no response; not the flinch of an eyelash or the movement of a finger.

  “Let’s start over. I’m Ellen Barton. Who are you?”

  Again, nothing.

  “I’m guessing you’re running away from something. Or maybe playing some game. When I was a girl, my sister and I used to play pirates in the woods. And Cinderella. That was my favorite because Julia had to clean the room while I put on pretty dresses for the ball. It’s always best to be the older kid.”

  It was like talking to a photograph.

  “Why don’t you come on down from there before you fall? I’ll make sure you’re safe.”

  Ellie talked for another fifteen minutes or so, saying everything she could think of, then she just ran out of words. Not once had the girl responded or moved. Frankly, it didn’t even appear that she was breathing.

  Ellie walked back to Earl and Peanut and Cal.

  “How we gonna get her down, Chief?” Earl asked, looking worried. His pale, sweaty forehead pleated into folds. He nervously smoothed his almost bald head, reemphasizing the red comb-over that had been his look for more years than anyone could count.

  Ellie had no idea what to do. She had all kinds of manuals and reference books at the station, and she’d memorized most of them for her captain’s test. There were chapters on murder, mayhem, robberies, and kidnapping, but there wasn’t a damn paragraph devoted to getting a silent child and her snarling wolf pup out of a tree on Main Street. “Anyone see her climb up?”

  “Mrs. Grimm. She said the kid was up to no good—maybe lookin’ to steal apples from the barrels out front at the market. When Doc Fischer yelled at her, the girl ran across the street and jumped into the tree.”

  “Jumped?” Ellie said. “She’s twenty feet in the air, for God’s sake.”

  “I didn’t believe it either, Chief, but several witnesses agreed. They say she ran like the wind, too. Mrs. Grimm crossed herself when she was tellin’ me.”

  Ellie felt the start of a headache. By suppertime the whole town would have heard the story of a girl who ran like the wind and jumped into the uppermost limbs of a maple tree. No doubt by then they’d say she could shoot fire from her fingertips and fly from branch to branch.

  “We need a plan,” Ellie said, more to herself than anyone else.

  “The volunteer fire department got Scamper outta that Doug fir on Peninsula Road.”

  “Scamper’s a cat, Earl,” Peanut said, crossing her arms.

  “I think I know that, Penelope. It ain’t like we got a protocol for kids stuck in trees. With wolves,” he added for good measure.

  Ellie touched the officer’s arm. “It’s a good idea, Earl, but she’s terrified. If she sees that big red ladder coming at her, she might fall.”

  Peanut tapped her long, star-spangled purple fingernail against her teeth. A sure sign of deep thought. Finally, she said, “I’ll bet she’s hungry.”

  “You think everyone’s hungry,” Cal said.

  “I do not.”

  “Do, too. How ’bout if I try talking to her, El?” Cal said. “My Sarah is about her age.”

  “No. Let me talk to her,” Peanut said. “I’m a mom, after all.”

  “I’m a dad.”

  “Shut up, you two,” Ellie snapped. “Earl, go to the diner and order me a nice hot meal. Some milk, too. Maybe a slice of Barbara’s apple pie.”

  “You’re a genius, Ellie. Mrs. Grimm thought the girl was tryin’ to steal food,” Earl said, grinning broadly. “I seen something like this on one of them cop shows. I think it was—”

  “I was the one who mentioned it,” Peanut said, puffing up.

  “You always mention food,” Cal said. “It’s hardly noteworthy.”

  “And clear the streets,” Ellie cut in before they started up again. “I want everyone gone for a two-block radius.”

  Earl’s smile faded. “They won’t wanna go.”

  “We’re the law, Earl. Make them go home.”

  He looked at her sideways. They both knew he didn’t have much experience with being the law. Although he’d patrolled these streets for decades, he’d spent most of that time going for coffee and handing out parking tickets. “Maybe I should call Myra. Everyone listens to her.”

  “You don’t need your wife to clear the streets, Earl. If you have to, start writing tickets. You know how to do that.”

  Earl slumped in a hangdog way and headed for the hair salon. When he reached the drugstore, a crowd immediately formed around him. After a moment they groaned loudly.

  Peanut crossed her arms and made a clucking sound. “This is the biggest thing to hit town since Raymond Weller drove his car into Thelma’s R.V. You aren’t going to be Miss Popular for making them miss it.”

  Ellie looked at her best friend. “Them?”

  Peanut’s eyes rounded in disbelief. “Surely you don’t mean me, too?”

  “We’ve got a terrified girl up there, Pea, and by the looks of it, something isn’t right with her. Entertaining the folks of Rain Valley—you included—is hardly my first priority. Now you and Cal go back to the station and get me some kind of net. I don
’t imagine its going to be easy to catch that poor thing. Call Nick in Mystic. And Ted over on the res. See if a kid got lost in the park today. Cal, you call Mel. He’s probably out by the park entrance, trying to ticket tourists. Tell him to start canvassing the town. She’s not a local kid, but maybe she’s staying with someone.”

  “I, for one, can follow orders,” Cal said, heading for the cruiser.

  Peanut didn’t move.

  “Go,” Ellie said again.

  Peanut sighed dramatically. “I’m going.”

  AN HOUR AND A HALF LATER THE STREETS OF DOWNTOWN RAIN VALLEY were quiet. The shops had all been locked up, and the parking slots were empty. Just out of sight there were two police barricades set up. No doubt Peanut and Cal were having the time of their lives as the official voices of Police Chief Ellen Barton.

  “I guess you’re thinking it’s sorta weird that a woman is the chief of police,” Ellie said, sitting as still as she could on the uncomfortable iron and wooden bench beneath the maple tree. She’d been here for almost an hour and it was becoming obvious that she wouldn’t be able to talk the kid down. It wasn’t entirely surprising. Ellie could drive safely at one hundred miles per hour, shoot a bird from five hundred feet away, and make a grown man confess to burglary, but what she knew about children wouldn’t fill a thimble.

  But Peanut and Cal—who did know kids—both thought talking was the ticket. It was the “A” plan. They all agreed it would be best if the girl came down on her own. So Ellie talked.

  She glanced down at the platter at the base of the tree. Two perfectly roasted chickens were surrounded by apple and orange slices. A freshly baked apple pie rested on a separate plate. There were several paper plates and forks set in a neat stack. The glass of milk had long since warmed.

  It should have been kid food—cheeseburgers and fries and pizza. Why hadn’t she thought of that before?

  Still, it smelled heavenly. Ellie’s stomach grumbled, reminding her that it was past dinnertime, and she wasn’t accustomed to missing meals. If it weren’t for daily aerobics classes at the local dance studio, she would certainly have packed on the pounds since high school. And Lord knew a woman of her petite stature couldn’t afford to gain weight. Not when she was unmarried and looking for love.

  She cocked her head ever so slightly to the left and looked up.

  The girl stared back at her with an unsettling intensity. Eyes the color of a shallow Caribbean sea looked out from beneath a dark fringe of lashes. For a split second Ellie was reminded of her second honeymoon, when she’d first seen a tropical ocean and the hordes of small, dark-skinned children who played in the waves. Those children, as thin as they were, had been full of smiles and laughter.

  She glanced across the street to the huge rhododendron in front of the hardware store. Behind it, she knew, a man from Animal Control had his rifle trained in this direction. It was loaded with a tranquilizer dart for the wolf pup. Behind him, a worker from the local game farm was ready with a muzzle and a cage.

  Keep talking.

  She sighed. “I didn’t really set out to become a cop. I just sort of bumped into it; that’s how life works for me. Now my sister, Julia, she’s a planner. By the time she was ten years old she wanted to be a doctor. Me, I just wanted her Barbie collection.” She smiled ruefully. “I was twenty-one the second time I got married. When that marriage tanked, I moved back in with my dad. That is not a high point for a girl who can legally drink . . . and boy, did I drink. Margaritas and karaoke were my life back then. I meant to try out for a band, but somehow I never did. Story of my life. Anyway, my Uncle Joe was the chief of police. He made a deal with me: if I’d go to the Police Academy, he’d ignore my parking tickets.” She shrugged. “I had nothing better to do, so I went. When I got home, Uncle Joe hired me on. Turns out I was born for this job.” She shot a glance at the girl.

  No movement. Nothing.

  Ellie’s stomach grumbled loudly.

  “Aw, hell.” She reached down for the chicken and tore off a leg.

  As she bit into it, she couldn’t help closing her eyes for just a second. She chewed slowly, swallowed.

  The leaves rustled. The branch creaked.

  Ellie stilled. She felt a breeze move through the park; it scratched the drying leaves.

  The girl leaned forward. The pink tip of her tongue showed between her lips. Ellie noticed that the girl was missing one front tooth.

  “Come on,” she whispered. When there was no movement, Ellie tried different words, hoping for a connection. The stories and sentences weren’t working. Maybe simpler was the answer. “Down. Here. Chicken. Pie. Dinner. Food.”

  At that, the girl dropped from the branch, landing like a cat, quietly and on all fours, with the pup still in her arms.

  Impossible. The child’s bones should have snapped like twigs on impact.

  Ellie felt something in her gut tighten. She wasn’t a fanciful or superstitious woman, but just now, sitting here on this bench, staring at this filthy, scrawny child with her silent white wolf pup, she felt a kind of awe.

  The girl’s gaze locked on her. Those beautiful, eerie blue-green eyes seemed to see everything.

  Ellie didn’t move, didn’t even breathe.

  The girl tilted her chin and sniffed the air, then slowly released her hold on the wolf, who stayed close beside her. She took a cautious step toward the chicken.

  Then another.

  And another.

  Ellie released her breath as quietly as she could. The girl moved like a wild animal, sniffing, sensing. The wolf pup shadowed her every move.

  Finally the girl broke eye contact and went for the food.

  Ellie had never seen anything like it. The two looked more like litter mates over a kill than anything else. The girl kept tearing off chunks of chicken and stuffing them in her mouth.

  Ellie reached slowly behind her and gathered up her net.

  Please God. Let this work. She didn’t have a clue what Plan B was.

  In a perfect cheerleader turn, Ellie pulled out the net and tossed it toward the girl. It settled over the child and the wolf pup and hit the ground. When they realized they’d been caught, all hell broke loose.

  The girl went crazy. She threw herself to the ground and rolled to get free, her grimy fingers clawing at the nylon net. The more she struggled to be free, the tighter she was bound.

  The wolf pup snarled. When the red dart hissed into his side, he let out a surprised yelp, then staggered and fell over.

  The girl howled. It was a terrible, harrowing sound.

  “It’s okay, honey,” Ellie said, finally moving toward them. “Don’t be afraid. He’s not hurt. I’m going to send him to a nice, safe place.”

  The girl pulled the sleeping pup into her lap and stroked him furiously, trying to waken him. At her failure, she howled again, another desperate, keening wail of pain that cut through the quiet and sent a flock of crows into the darkening sky.

  Ellie inched around behind the child. As she approached, she noticed the smell. Dying black leaves and fecund, overripe earth; beneath it all was the ammonia scent of urine.

  She swallowed hard and let the hypodermic slip down from its hiding place in her sleeve. Carefully, she stabbed the girl’s rump and gave her the injection.

  The child screamed in pain and twisted around to face her.

  “I’m sorry,” Ellie said. “It’s just protective custody. You’ll go to sleep for a minute or two. I won’t let anyone hurt you.”

  The girl scrambled backward to avoid Ellie’s touch and lost her balance. Another wailing howl came up her throat and then she collapsed. Lying there, coiled around the unconscious pup, the girl looked impossibly frail and young, and more helpless than any person Ellie had ever seen.

  IN THE LAST FEW MOMENTS OF THE CLIMB, THE PALE PACIFIC SKY BEGAN to slowly turn from burnished gold to the palest salmon hue.

  He paused in his descent, breathing hard, and swung around, dangling from his rope and harness, to ta
ke in the view.

  From his perch on the granite face, some four hundred vertical feet above the crystalline blue beauty of an unnamed alpine lake, Max Cerrasin could see the world. All around him were the jagged, imposing peaks of the Olympic Mountains. The breathtaking, awe-inspiring landscape felt as far from civilization as anywhere on Earth. For all he knew, he was the first person to climb this jutting, dangerous slab of rock.

  That was what he loved about this sport. When you were high above the world, anchored to a bit of stone by a piece of metal and your own courage, there was no outside world. No worries, no stresses, no memories of what you’d lost.

  There was only the extreme beauty, the solitude, and the risk. He loved that most of all: the risk.

  There was nothing like imminent danger to make a man know he was alive.

  Still breathing hard, sweating, he climbed down slowly, finding his way inch by inch, caressing the granite, feeling it for weaknesses and instability.

  His foot missed once and he started to fall. The rock crumbled beneath his hand and skittered away, pelting his face.

  In the split second that he was free, he felt his stomach clench and his heart kick into overdrive. He reached out, grabbed hold.

  And found purchase.

  He laughed in relief and rested his forehead on the cool stone as his heartbeat settled back down to normal.

  Then he wiped sweat from his brow and kept moving downward. As he got closer to the ground, he moved faster, more sure of himself. He was almost there—less than thirty feet from safety—when his cell phone rang.

  He dropped to the ground, fished his phone out of his pack, and flipped it open. He knew before he saw the number that it was an emergency.

  NEWS OF THE GIRL’S APPEARANCE SPREAD THROUGH RAIN VALLEY LIKE a spring shower. By nine o’clock that evening crowds had formed outside of the county hospital. Cal was answering one phone call after another. He’d surprised Ellie by offering to work late. Usually he raced home to make dinner for his wife and kids. But by now the story being told was of a flying wolf girl with magical powers over the weather, and everyone wanted to be part of it. Tomorrow morning there would be lines at the Olympic Game Farm; everyone wanted to see the wolf pup they’d captured.