Джонатан Келлерман - When the Bough Breaks

“He’s a minister – the head of that children’s home I told you about.”

“I see. Taking out the Lord’s trash, so to speak.”

“So to speak. Can you tell me anything about him.”

“I honestly can’t, I’m afraid. I had no contact with the nonacademic employees – there’s a tendency to pretend they’re invisible that’s acquired over time. He was a big brute of a fellow, that I do recall. Slovenly, seemed quite strong, may very well have been bright – your information certainly points in that direction, and I’m no social Darwinist with a need to dispute it. But that is really all I can tell you. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. One last thing – where can I get a map of Brindamoor Island?”

“There’s none that I know of outside the County Hall of Records – wait, a student of mine did an undergraduate thesis on the history of the place, complete with residential map. I don’t have a copy but I believe it would be stored in the library, in the thesis section. The student’s name was – let me think – Church? No, it was something else of a clerical nature – Chaplain. Gretchen Chaplain. Look under C, you should find it.”

“Thanks again, Professor. Goodbye.”

“Goodbye.”

Margaret Dopplemeier sat at her desk, glaring at me.

“I’m sorry for being rude,” I said. “It was important.”

“All right,” she said. “I just thought you could have been a little more polite in view of what I’ve done for you.” The possessive look slithered into her eyes like a python into a lagoon.

“You’re right. I should have. I won’t trouble you further.” I stood up. “Thanks so much for everything.” I held out my hand, and when she reluctantly extended hers, I took it. “You’ve really made a big difference.”

“That’s good to know. How long will you be staying?”

Gently I broke the handclasp.

“Not long.” I backed away, smiled at her, finally got my hand on the knob and pushed. “All the best, Margaret. Enjoy your blackberries.”

She started to say something, then thought better of it. I left her standing behind her desk, a circle of pink tongue-tip visible in the corner of her unattractive mouth, searching for a taste of something.

The library was properly austere and very respectably stocked with books and journals for a college the size of Jedson. The main room was a marble cathedral draped in heavy red velvet and lit by oversized windows placed ten feet apart. It was filled with oak reading tables, green-shaded lamps, leather chairs. All that was missing were people to read the august volumes that papered the walls.

The librarian was an effete young man with close cropped hair and a pencil mustache. His shirt was red plaid, his tie a yellow knit. He sat behind his reference table reading a recent copy of Artforum . When I asked him where the thesis section was, he looked up with the astonished expression of a hermit observing the penetration of his lair.

“There,” he said, languidly, and pointed to a spot at the south end of the room.

There was an oak card catalog and I found Gretchen Chaplain’s thesis listed in it. The title of her magnum opus had been Brindamoor Island: Its History and Geography .

Theses by Frederick Chalmers and O. Winston Chastain were present, but Gretchen’s rightful place between them was unfilled. I checked and double checked the Library of Congress number but that was a fruitless ritual: The Brindamoor study was gone.

I went back to Plaid Shirt and had to clear my throat twice before he tore himself away from a piece on Billy Al Bengston.

“Yes?”

“I’m looking for a specific thesis and can’t seem to find it.”

“Have you checked the card file to make sure it’s listed?”

“The card’s there but the thesis isn’t.”

“How unfortunate. I would guess it’s been checked out.”

“Could you check for me, please?”

He sighed and took too long to raise himself out of his chair. “What’s the author’s name?”

I gave him all the necessary information and he went behind the checkout counter with an injured look. I followed him.

“Brindamoor Island – dreary place. Why would you want to know about that?”

“I’m a visiting professor from UCLA and it’s part of my research. I didn’t know an explanation was necessary.”

“Oh, it’s not,” he said quickly and buried his nose in a stack of cards. He lifted out a portion of the cards and shuffled them like a Vegas pro. “Here,” he said, “that thesis was checked out six months ago – my, it’s overdue, isn’t it?”

I took the card. Scant attention had been paid to Gretchen’s masterpiece. Prior to its last withdrawal a half year ago, the last time it had been checked out was in 1954, by Gretchen herself. Probably wanted to show it to her kids – Mummy was once quite a scholar, little ones…

“Sometimes we get behind on checking on overdue notices. I’ll get right on this, Professor. Who checked it out last?”

I looked at the signature and told him. As the name left my mouth my brain processed the information. By the time the two words had dissolved I knew my mission wouldn’t be complete without a trip to the island.

The ferry to Brindamoor Island made its morning trip at seven-thirty.

When the wake-up call from the desk came in at six it found me showered, shaved and tensely bright eyed. The rain had started again shortly after midnight, pounding the glass walls of the suite. It had roused me for a dreamlike instant during which I was certain I’d heard the sound of cavalry hooves stampeding down the corridor, and had gone back to sleep anyway. Now it continued to come down, the city below awash and out of focus, as if viewed from inside a dirty aquarium.

I dressed in heavy slacks, leather jacket, wool turtleneck, and took along the only raincoat I had: an unlined poplin doublebreasted affair that was fine for Southern California but of uncertain utility in the present surroundings. I caught a quick breakfast of smoked salmon, bagels, juice and coffee and made it to the docks at ten after seven.

I was among the first to queue up at the entrance to the auto bay. The line moved and I drove down a ramp into the womb of the ferry behind a VW bus with Save the Whale stickers on the rear bumper. I obeyed the gesticulations of a crewman dressed in dayglo orange overalls and parked two inches from the slick, white wall of the bay. An ascent of two flights brought me on deck. I walked past a gift shop, tobacconist and snack bar, all closed, and a blackened room furnished wall to wall with video games. A waiter played Pac Man in solitude, devouring dots with brow furrowing concentration.

I found a seat with a view at the stern, folded my raincoat across my lap and settled back for the one hour ride.

The ship was virtually empty. My few fellow passengers were young and dressed for work: hired help from the mainland commuting to their assigned posts at the manors of Brindamoor. The return trip, no doubt, would be filled with commuters of another class: lawyers, bankers, other financial types, on their way to downtown offices and paneled boardrooms.

The ocean pitched and rolled, frothing in response to the surface winds that drag-raced along its surface. There were smaller craft at sea, mostly fishing boats, tugs and scows, and they danced in command, curtsying and dipping. For all the ferry moved it might have been a toy model on a shelf.

A group of six young men in their late teens came aboard and sat down ten feet away. Blond, bearded in varying degrees of shagginess, dressed in rumpled khakis and dirt-grayed jeans, they passed around a thermos full of something that wasn’t coffee, joked, smoked, put their feet up on chairs and emitted a collective guffaw that sounded like a beery laugh track. One of them noticed me and held up the thermos.