The Long Sleep (14 page)

Finally Ben was up, showered, and
breakfasted. Keeping my voice low, I asked him if he would go over
the car again. “I don’t think Dad even knows what a bomb looks
like.”

“There are different kinds,” Ben said.

“The kind they’d put in a car.” I knew Ben
would know. It was the sort of thing he looked up on the Internet.
Not to build one, but because he wanted to know. When he was
younger, he went through a phase of being totally fascinated by
explosives and how they worked. He never actually exploded
anything. Although he probably would have liked to, and could
have.

I stood far back to watch as he examined the
car inside and out. He thought of the undercarriage all by himself.
The gas tank. The gas line and braking system. Daddy came out with
his coffee mug and watched, too.

My dad was a sweet guy, with prematurely
white hair and a wide, pleasant smile. “Don’t trust me, huh?” he
said, turning the smile on me.

I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. “It’s
just a double check. This is my life at stake. Once it’s gone, it’s
gone.”

“We can’t have that,” said Daddy, as Ben slid
under the car. On his back. Wearing a new winter parka.

I said, “We need one of those hoist things
they have in garages.”

My dad took a sip of coffee. “What we need is
not to have to worry all the time.”

My fault. My fault.

“I didn’t
know.
You guys kind of liked
him, too, at first.” I saw Ben detach something and shove it into
his pocket. I could see only part of his arm.

“Don’t put a bomb in your pocket!” I
screeched.

“It’s not a bomb.” He eased himself out from
under the car. “It’s a tracking device.”

I blew out the breath I was holding. Then
caught it again and said, “I wonder how long it’s been there.”

“It couldn’t be long.” Ben brushed himself
off. “You had the car at Barger’s just a few days ago.”

I tried to get the grime off his back, but he
eluded me. He never liked people’s hands all over him.

“How do you know it’s a tracking device?” I
asked.

“I know what they look like.”

Ben knew everything. Whenever he got
interested in something, he would look it up and study it until he
got to be an expert.

“Where does he track it from?” I
wondered.

“His car.”

The Yellow Monster. “Now that you’ve got it,
he’s going to track you.”

Ben glared.

I said, “I am definitely telling Rick about
this.”

Ben took the device from his pocket and held
it out to me. I backed away.

“It won’t explode,” he said.

“How can you be sure it’s not a bomb
disguised as a tracking device?” At his look of exasperation, I
took the thing and set it down on my hood.

Daddy, standing by with his coffee, took a
sip and said, “All life is a gamble. But this is unnecessary.”

I didn’t enjoy having someone gamble with my
life. I put in a call to Rick and left a message. It was short and
cryptic. How could I be sure Evan didn’t have something tuned into
my cell phone? He was still making me paranoid.

Paranoia is a delusion that you’re being
persecuted. What do they call it if the persecution is real?

It was almost noon before Rick called me
back. All I could think of was Hank in the hospital and how I
wanted to get to him. Evan’s warfare had me in jitters as I sobbed
out my story.

“He was here last night. I heard the dogs
again, and a car slammed shut. I don’t know how he got into it.
I’ve been keeping it locked. Come to think of it, he didn’t get in.
My brother found a tracking device on the underside. He’s a
devil.
But I know somebody who might know where he is.”

“Yeah? Where’s that?”

I held the phone away from my ear and studied
it. How would I know if Evan could listen in? A wireless phone is
not secure.

“I said
might
know. I don’t know if
she really does. She might just be in love with him, the stupid
twit. I can say that,” I explained, “because I was there once
myself. And look where it led to.”

“Do you have that device?” he asked.

“Right here. I’d take it to the station but
I’m still afraid to drive my car. Are you working today? I could
try to get up my nerve.”

“Don’t take a chance if you’re worried. I’ll
come by in a while.”

I did want to get to the hospital, but this
was more important. This might actually accomplish something, if it
helped convict Evan.
If
they ever found him. I thought how
neat it would be if a tracking device could be made to work in
reverse. Maybe Ben would know a way.

Neater still if Evan confessed to shooting
Hank. But that was unlikely. Psychopaths don’t do remorse, and they
are inveterate liars. Even if cornered, Evan would go right on
lying. Why hadn’t anyone, in all those years at Lakeside, picked up
on his psychopathology?

Maybe they did and there was nothing they
could do about it. As far as I knew, it’s not curable.

And then there was the football thing, which
supposedly brought glory to the school. People could get their
values all twisted about that.

While waiting for Rick, I went over my notes
from Lakeside. My mind was on Hank more than Paula. If Hank was off
the ventilator for even that short time, there must be hope. But
then, Paula had breathed on her own for five years without
regaining consciousness.

There had to be hope. I had to get to the
hospital.

A black unmarked car turned in at the
driveway. At least it wasn’t yellow. Rick got out of it.

I invited him in, but he declined. He wore
his uniform and had to get back to the station. He shook hands with
my parents. He wanted to see Ben, but Ben had gone off somewhere,
probably with Cree.

Rick took the device and studied it, holding
it in his bare hands. It was already covered with everyone’s smudgy
fingerprints. Except Evan’s, if Evan was smart. Which he was,
unfortunately.

I said, “Maybe he’ll pick you up and follow
you to the station.”

“He’d probably catch on before he got there,”
Rick said.

“I don’t see how he can drive around in that
bright yellow car and not be found.”

“What makes you think he’s still driving a
bright yellow car?”

I hadn’t thought of that. “I hate him.”

“Just stay alert. And keep your doors
locked.”

“I can’t live like this!”

“Easy, easy,” Rick advised. Sure, he could
say that. Glyn, too. “Keep cool. Don’t let him get to you. Sooner
or later he’ll screw up and then we’ll have him.”

“It had better be sooner, before I have a
breakdown.”

“That’s not keeping cool,” he said, and
left.

“Okay,” I told my folks, “I’m heading out. If
anything happens to me, here’s Falco’s number.” I wrote it down,
both his cell phone and the station. By then I had memorized them
both.

Rhoda smiled. “He gave us his card. But
thanks anyway.”

Rick was becoming almost a member of the
family. I wondered what sort of family he really had. I thought
about it all the way into Southbridge and forgot to worry about the
brakes. Or anything else. Both Daddy and Ben had inspected the car.
It was lucky that some family members were interested enough in
cars to know something about them. I had never cared in the
slightest, but you can’t always count on some knowledgeable person
being available. For my own preservation, I had better learn more
than Evan knew.

I drove through Southbridge and onto the
highway toward the hospital. What if Hank’s family was there? It
was Saturday, a day off for a lot of people. I was surprised I had
never run into them, although I did see his mother that time. I
didn’t know if she saw me, or gave me any thought at all. Even if I
explained that Hank and I were working on a story, it was obvious
that Hank wasn’t participating much.

How could Evan do a thing like that? He’d
been nasty to me, but not lethal.

Except when he cut my brake line. He knew
about the steep hill. He knew I’d have to go down it to get to
school or almost anywhere. Maybe he thought it would only frighten
me.
Just try going down that hill with no brakes, Evan
Steffers.
What an asshole.

At the hospital, I waved as I passed the
volunteers at the reception desk. They had security guards at night
and volunteers during visiting hours. By then some of them knew me.
I was such a regular. I grabbed an elevator that was starting to
close and thought about applying as a volunteer myself. Then I’d
have an excuse for being there every day.

Rhoda would squawk about homework. I could
say it would look good on my college application.

Hey, there was an idea. I almost forgot to
notice when the elevator stopped at my floor. Prying the door open,
I scrambled off.

I reached the nurses’ station at the ICU, my
eyes fixed on Hank’s window.

His bed was empty, stripped down to the
mattress.

No!
I swallowed a horrible
feeling.

Abaya, the nurse, was just coming back from
one of the rooms. He gave me a hesitant smile, not quite
remembering who I was.

I couldn’t smile back. “Where is he?”

“He?”

I pointed to the empty bed.

“Oh. Mr. Dalbeck. He got moved,” Abaya
said.

“Moved where?”

“He’s in a regular room. Third floor.”

“Did he—wake up?”

“Not yet. He’s breathing. Without the
ventilator.”

“But he needed the ventilator again just a
few days ago. How could they put him in a regular room when he
still has trouble breathing?”

“Don’t worry about it, miss. He has a heart
monitor. They’ll know if he needs help. They know what they’re
doing.”

I doubted that. Nobody
always
knows
what they’re doing. Although I was pretty sure they knew more than
I did.

“Third floor? Do you know when the visiting
hours are?”

“Eleven to seven. You can go there now if you
want to.”

“Thank you, Mr. Abaya. You said he’s still
unconscious?”

“Yes. But you can visit him.”

I was of two minds. I was glad I could get
near him, talk to him. At the same time, this made him more
vulnerable. He wasn’t under such close observation. What if whoever
shot him decided to finish what they’d started?

I would have to let Rick know about this new
development, if he didn’t already.

I found Hank’s room and peeked in cautiously,
in case his family was there.

He was alone. A single room to himself. Not
even a guard outside the door. Why wasn’t there a guard? What
happened had been a
murder
attempt. I would definitely have
to tell Rick.

Hank’s eyes were closed. He was breathing.
Slow, deep breaths, as if he were asleep. I wished it really were
sleep and not a coma. I crept close to his bed, feeling I had to
tiptoe, as it was so quiet. He didn’t even have the ventilator
making noise.

“Hank?” I was afraid of waking him, even
though I wanted him awake. I bent over his sleeping face. I hadn’t
been this close to him since just after the shooting, when I held
him in my arms. He looked different. Thinner. He looked, in fact,
not quite real.

I pulled a chair over next to his bed. His
arms rested on top of a white cotton blanket. I took his hand and
studied it. It was warm, but limp. It had no real life. Would he
ever be alive again?

I felt a new surge of anger. How did they get
away with this while Hank, innocent and far more valuable, was
reduced to a vegetable who could do no more than breathe?

“Hank, it’s Maddie Canfield. The new girl at
The Tiger’s Roar.
When you saw me there, it was my first
meeting. The one where we talked about—”

I didn’t want to mention the right to die. It
might make him think too much about that.

“Anyway, I was going to drive you home
when—this happened. We’d just gotten into my car. I’m so sorry. But
they tell me you’re doing okay. They took the breathing tube out.
You’re breathing by yourself. You’re in a regular room now instead
of intensive care. Even when you were in ICU I came to visit you as
often as I could, but they wouldn’t let me in because I wasn’t
family. Only your family could get near you. I saw your mother
there. And I went to your house to get a picture of you for the
paper and I met your sister.”

I looked toward the door to be sure none of
his family was on its way in.

“I wrote an article about you for the paper.
About what happened. That’s why I needed your picture. I’ll save
copies for you.”

I folded my hand around his and looked again
at the door. If anybody did come, I could say I was on the
newspaper staff. Arianne already knew it.

“We’re going ahead with the series you
planned. I think it’s very timely. I hope you don’t mind. I only
wish you were there with us. I’ve been doing a lot of research on
Paula Welbourne, the Lakeside girl, because I’m a Lakeside girl
myself. Mr. Geyer thought it was intrusive but he didn’t try to
stop us. I mean, he suggested stopping but he didn’t insist.”

I decided not to mention the Evan connection.
It was too complicated to explain to an unconscious person, even if
he could hear me.

Very lightly I squeezed his hand. “I don’t
want to wear you out so I’d better be going, but I’ll come back. I
just want you to know . . .” Another quick glance at the door.
“Hank, I love you.” I bent down and kissed his forehead.

Chapter Twelve

In the hospital
parking lot, I gave my car a onceover before opening the door. I
checked each side, and underneath as far as I could see.

Again I wished I had a car that Evan wouldn’t
recognize. Maybe a paint job would do it. But even that would cost
more than I could manage. And if he had such easy access to our
driveway at home, he would see whatever I put there and know it was
mine.