"She does."
"And there was nothing strange?"
Jared frowned. "Like what?"
"I don"t know. That"s why I"m asking."
"No, there was nothing. She kissed me. Told me she was going to pick up my shirts. Hurried the kids along."
Cobb asked if Jared had called the local hospital. Had he called the area hospital? No, said Jared. They called Morristown Memorial only to learn that no unidentified women had been brought in the last twenty-four hours.
"What about identified women?" asked Ezra. Has anyone been brought in with the kinds of injuries that would have limited the patient"s ability to call home? Severed arms perhaps? Amnesia?
Jared perked up. Perhaps that was it. Perhaps his wife had been flattened by a small vehicle, unhurt, except to develop amnesia, a total loss of memory that would prevent her from calling home. She came to in an amnesiac fog. She didn"t even know it was a Friday. She didn"t know who she was, didn"t know her own name. So she got on the road and she started walking.
Cobb"s response deflated his musings. No unidentified females meant no females, not some females who had amnesia.
"But maybe she hadn"t been brought in?" he said, hopefully. (With hope?) Was he hoping she had been knocked down, not killed, and not brought in? Just an amnesiac wandering the streets of Short Hills?
"It"s unlikely, sir," said Cobb.
"My wife not being home the entire Friday, not calling, and leaving her purse, her wallet, her car keys is also unlikely," Jared said. "What else could have happened to her?"
Cobb said she could"ve been kidnapped. Was there any sign of struggle in the house?
"Kidnapped! Struggle!" Jared"s raised voice was but a small outward indication of the turmoil inside him. "No, there was no struggle." He hadn"t even considered it. Perhaps it was possible. She had let ina"who? Who could Larissa have let into the house? "Who could have taken her? And for what?"
"People get kidnapped every day for all kinds of reasons. Ransom perhaps? Where do you work?"
"Prudential," replied an exasperated Jared. "But if someone had taken her and kept her for ransom, wouldn"t they have called in the last fourteen hours? What kind of bogus ransom kidnapping is it if I don"t even know about it?"
Cobb and Finney agreed it was odd. Still, they weren"t dismissing the possibility, nor others by the looks of their discomfited expressions. They stood in the middle of the kitchen refusing a drink and glancing warily at each other. Jared couldn"t figure out why they were studying him.
"So what do I do now?" he asked. "Usually I know where she is at all times. She has never not been home on a Friday night. I don"t mean sometimes, or occasionally, or seldom. I mean, never not been home. Something terrible must have happened."
The rotund Finney nodded. The apathetic Cobb didn"t. "Do you?" he pointedly asked Jared.
"Do I what?"
"Do you know where your wife is at all times?"
It took much strength for Jared not to raise his voice, not to take a linebacker step forward, not to lose his temper. "What does that mean?" he demanded. "What are you asking?"
"Don"t get upset, sir. I"m asking a simple question. You"re at work all day, while she is here."
"She is not here," said Jared. "If she was here, I wouldn"t be calling you."
Finally they began to jot down information about her in their small reporter notebooks. How old she was, how tall she was. Distinguishing marks? Color hair? Attractive? Yes, said Ezra, Maggie, Jared. Attractive. What she was wearing? Jared didn"t know. It all depended on where she had been going. Going without a purse or wallet. Something she could"ve walked in, ran in? He kept coming back to that for some reason, that she had gone out for a stroll and was knocked down by a car. But thenaa woman didn"t just get knocked down w.i.l.l.y-nilly in the middle of suburban neighborhoods without someone noticing.
Maybe she went out for a brisk walk, a jog anda"and what? How to complete that sentence?
a"and had a heart attack and fell and died? And had a stroke and fell and died? Had a ruptured aneurysm, a cerebral hemorrhage. When morning came, Jared would go look for her in the woods near the golf course.
And then Cobb spoke, to break Jared"s reverie about Larissa falling down dead. "She could"ve been picked up by someone," he said. "Was driven out of the local area. Driven out of Jersey. To New York? To Pennsylvania? She could"ve gotten into an accident somewhere else. Or not." Cobb slapped closed his book. "She could be anywhere."
Jared got stuck on the first part of Cobb"s words. All his earlier efforts had been jutting up against a blank wall of her vanishing. Now Cobb brought up something Jared had not considered. "Picked up by who?"
"I don"t know, Mr. Stark," said Cobb. "I don"t know your wife."
Finney coughed a little. "Was there any trouble in your marriage?"
"Any what? No! What are you guys talking about? Trouble in my marriage? What kind of trouble would make a wife vanish like this?" Jared turned to Maggie. "Maggie, is what I"m saying true?"
Maggie shook her head. "She never said a word." She paused. "About anything." Slightly she shifted in her chair. Jared noticed. Finney noticed. Ezra, who was looking down into his tense hands, noticed. "Recently," Maggie said, "she seemed more distracted than usual. It wasn"t normal."
"Distracted?" Jared said incredulously. "Maggie, what does that even mean? What does it have to do with today, with tonight?"
"I don"t know, Jared," said Maggie. "Nothing? Everything? I"m just saying. It was out of the ordinary. That"s what the officer asked."
"Her being distracted during your lunches doesn"t translate into her being kidnapped out of her own home, does it? Or her falling down from a cerebral accident?"
"What cerebral accident?" asked Cobb suspiciously, and it was then that Jared realized: wait, they may think I had something to do with it. They must think this. That"s why they"re looking at me like that. Like I did something to her. Oh G.o.d.
Jared retreated. Literally took a step back from them, lowered his shoulders, his spine sloped, his mouth fell mute. There was nothing more to say. Desperate, he called them for help and they were eyeing him with suspicion. The raw injustice of it burned his eyes.
"My wife is missing," he said quietly, to no one in particular, wishing them to go, wishing they would all leave his house. "You"re here because I called you. I didn"t know what to do. I still don"t. Can you help me or not?"
Apparently they couldn"t help him yet. But they did give him their card and before leaving told him to call and file a formal report on Sunday morning if she hadn"t returned by then.
For the rest of the night, Jared sat on the sofa in the den, unable to go upstairs to their bedroom. He must have fallen asleep before dawn, though it felt as if he slept minutes before Michelangelo tumbled downstairs and, patting Riot, sleeping by Jared"s feet, said, "Dad, where is Mommy?"
It was only seven. Jared spooned some cereal into his son"s bowl, poured the milk, patted his head. After putting the boy in front of Sat.u.r.day morning T V, still in yesterday"s clothes he walked down the driveway to Bellevue, made a shoehorn left along the golf course and slowly walked up the street, between the houses and the dewy glinting green golf course, looking for something, anything, that might clue him into the clueless-ness. It was a crisp May morning. It smelled of the upcoming summer. The oaks had all bloomed, the red impatiens were fluttering; it was beautiful, the silence of the street, the distant view of the mountains. What was he looking for? He walked the half-mile circle up to the main road, looked left, looked right, turned around and walked back down Bellevue. He found nothing. He walked again, slower. He walked the third time. When he got to Summit Avenue, he didn"t know which way to go. The town of Summit was to the right, but what good did the town do him? She took no money with her! She wouldn"t have walked to Summit; what would the point be? She had play rehearsal in the opposite direction. She had to get in her Jaguar and drive to where people were waiting for her. She didn"t do this. Why? Jared turned around and started his fourth walk back home. It was after eight, he"d been out an hour. Tara was walking down her driveway in her robe, to pick up the paper. They lived in the large black and white Tudor two doors from the Starks. She waved.
"Good morning, Jared. Isn"t it a nice morning?"
"Tara," he said, coming up to her, "have you seen Larissa?"
"What do you mean? Today?"
"Yesterday."
"I talked to her," Tara said cheerily. "She called to confirm the play date and asked if I would mind picking Michelangelo up from school along with Jen. I said of course I didn"t mind."
"What time was this? The phone call?"
"Early. Nine? Maybe ten."
"Usually, would she pick him up?"
"Yes, usually. But that"s okay. She said she had scheduled some errands that might run late."
"What kind of errands?"
"She didn"t say. Why? Is everything okay?"
"I don"t know," Jared said. "I don"t know what to think. So you didn"t see her all day yesterday?"
"No. Wait, I did see her, briefly."
He stopped breathing, holding Tara"s words, trying to listen.
"I was running out in the car with Jess," said Tara, "and she was walking up Bellevue. I waved to her."
"Walking up Bellevue?"
"Yes, right here. In front of my house." Tara pointed behind Jared, to the street lining the golf course. "Like she does many times. She looked like she was going out for a brisk walk. But without Riot."
"Were her hands free? Was she carrying her purse?"
"Gee, I don"t remember. Why? Come to think of it, I think she was carrying something, like a dark bag, maybe a duffel. Which is why it didn"t quite seem like she was exercising, more like going somewhere."
"What was she wearing?"
"Oh, I don"t know, Jared. I"m sorry. Jeans, maybe?"
Jared stared at Tara interminably. Tara became uncomfortable. "What"s wrong? Is something wrong?"
"Larissa didn"t come home last night," he said in a hollow voice. "She"s still not back. I"m afraid something terrible"s happened."
Fl.u.s.tered, Tara said nervously, "No, no, everything seemed normal. When she called she sounded friendly, very much herself. Oh, my goodness. You think she got into some kind of accident?"
"Possibly. What time was this, when you saw her walking?"
"Not long after our phone call. Maybe 10:30? Quarter to eleven? Yes, it was probably closer to quarter to eleven, because Jess and I were going to the doctor at eleven, and I was putting her in the car. I drove past Larissa, opened the pa.s.senger window and waved to her. She waved back. I asked if she needed a ride. She said with a smile that no, she was fine. That was all. Everything seemeda""
Staggering backward, Jared had nothing more to say, nothing else to say.
At home Emily was awake, Asher still sleeping. "Em, hold the fort, okay?" Jared said. "I"ll be right back."
"Where are you going? You"ve just come back! I have volleyball practice at eleven."
"I"ll be back before then."
"Asher has his playoff game at 11:30."
"Way before then, Em."
"Michelangelo goes to art cla.s.s with Mom at ten."
"Probably today," Jared said, "we will have to cancel art. We"ll try again next week."
He drove slowly up Bellevue, made a right on Summit, and headed toward town. He drove up and down the local streets, drove past the hospital, drove past the library and the train station, past the diners and Maggie"s Dominican Monastery. Could she be in there? Around and around he spun his wheels, circling the square of town, trying to traverse the bewilderment of the distance between himself and Larissa. What did St. Augustine say? Jared took a course on him in college; could he remember a blessed thing? Don"t you believe that there is in man a deep so profound as to be hidden even to him in whom it is?
The streets are spotless, broom-swept clean. Not a thing out of place. Trash cans every fifty feet as required by ordinance. Flags on the lampposts. Nothing rusted or unpainted. Windex shine on all the gla.s.s in the stores, impeccable displays, cobblestones, pristine sidewalks, landscaped parks, sun shining. Everything like a picture. Like their house with the Christmas lights on and snow on the evergreens.
He didn"t get back in his futility until noon, having lost all track of the hours. Emily was beyond herself. Asher, less enraged and more productive, had called up one of his friends and found a ride to his playoff game. Feeling himself a failure on all fronts, Jared scooped up a shoddily dressed Michelangelo and went to the baseball grounds downtown, where he stood blankly by the chain-link fence and when the other parents clapped or booed, he clapped and booed, while Michelangelo played on the playground, and Jack and Frank and Ted kept talking to Jared about Asher"s incredible pitching arm, and the Yankees" terrible pitching. He heard none of it and all of it. He didn"t know how he continued to stand. Sitting in the field bleachers, in the fifth inning, with his son"s game tied and the entire season on the line, Jared called Larissa"s mother.
"No, I haven"t heard from her," Barbara said. "But why is that unusual? I never hear from her. Is everything okay?"
"Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Great."
"She did invite me for the barbecue on Monday. Do you want me to bring anything?"
"What barbecue?"
"What barbecue? The party you"re having on Memorial Day. Jared! What"s wrong with you today?"
Oh s.h.i.t, the barbecue. "That"s right. Thanks so much, wonderful, can you bring some of your potato salad?"
"I always do. Tell the children I have something special for them."
"They"ll like that. Thanks, Barbara."
"See you Monday. Three?"
"Three is great."
When he hung up, the other team had scored four runs off Asher. Jared clapped. "Yeah! Go, Wildcats!" Except he was standing in a sea of dismal parents, who were booing and not clapping. His own son glared at him from the pitcher"s mound as if to say, what"s wrong with you, Dad?
What was wrong with him indeed. What time was it?
One.
O G.o.d.
And at home, Ezra"s Subaru was in the drive, and Emily was storming out the side door, fuming, ready to castigate him, and before she opened her mouth, Jared took her by the shoulders and said through his teeth because he didn"t want to upset Michelangelo, who was still in the car, "Emily, you need to look around you and see what"s happening. Your mother is missing! Have you noticed this? I don"t want to hear another word from you unless it"s to help me, you got it? I don"t want to hear about your missed games, or your cello, or your volleyball, or anything. Your. Mother. Is. Missing. You got that?" He never talked to Emily like this. He left the discipline to Larissa.
"I know," she said sullenly but not particularly sympathetically. "But she"s going to come back, right?" Clearly she thought whatever was happening would iron itself out like most adult things, but that her volleyball practice might have to go on without her was an irrecoverable travesty. Jared held the car door open for Michelangelo, nearly closing it on his son"s hand.
Ezra and Maggie were in his kitchen.
Vacantly he told them what Tara had told him. He didn"t tell them that he stood in the middle of Summit, in the middle of the street and listened to the dried-up screams in his throat. Where was she? What had happened? He was afraid they would think he was losing his mind.
When was the forty-eight hours going to be up? When could he file a report on a missing Larissa, and why would he want to engage Cobb and Finney again with their cold stares and presumptions of Jared didn"t even know what. And yet, what else could he do but file?
Maggie and Ezra brought Dylan, who babysat Michelangelo along with Emily, while Maggie called their friends, asking them to daisy-chain the news that due to a short-lived emergency, the Memorial Day bash was unfortunately being cancelled this year. She even called Larissa"s mother.
"You"re telling me not to come? But I just spoke to Jared, who told me to bring potato salad!"