Ridley Pearson - Beyond Recognition

But she had to check in. Officially off-duty, she knew Boldt was nonetheless counting on her. She called her voice mail, to check messages, with one eye on her car, wondering how she had been so stupid as to park directly under a streetlight. When things went wrong, she decided, they went wrong in a big way.

There were six messages: one from Owen, two from Susan, two from Boldt, and one from Emily Richland. Of all the calls, it was Emily Richland’s she returned; the woman had sounded half out of her mind.

“Daphne Matthews,” she announced when the woman said hello.

“He was here,” Emily Richland confessed immediately, without introduction or small talk. “When you came looking for him, he was here. I hid him. I lied, and I know now that was stupid.”

Daphne felt her heart racing away from her. She tried to calm herself, but the woman’s agitation was contagious.

Emily continued, “He ran away. Left the house while we were talking, I imagine. But of course I expected him back, and he never returned. He hasn’t returned. A long time now, and he hasn’t returned.”

“Probably doesn’t trust either of us,” Daphne allowed, trying to calm the other.

“No, it’s not that,” said Emily nervously.

“Then what?”

“Listen. I don’t expect you to believe this…. I know you don’t believe this. Maybe it’s impossible for you to. But I beg you to believe just this one time. At least hear what it is I have to say.”

“Go on.” Daphne fought against her own desire to shout, to scold the woman. Get on with it! she wanted to say.

“I do have visions. I really do. You must believe me. And I’ve had one tonight. Several times. The first time …”

Daphne could hear the woman’s voice falter, and the tears begin. She struggled with her own emotions to keep from giving in to the other’s. Tricks! she reminded herself. Emily Richland was a professional liar, nothing more.

“He was dead. On the ground, his eyes open.” Emily broke down crying-sobbing-into the phone. If it was an act, it was a damn good one. “Ben,” she muttered, “lying there on the ground. Oh, God…. And then, just now-right before you called-a second image. All dark and a fence, and Ben’s face pressed up against it. He’s in trouble, I know he is! I know this. I’ve seen it! And I don’t know what to do about it!”

Daphne did not want to reveal the terror she was experiencing. The images of the boy were fixed in her head. To give the woman some encouragement seemed the best route. “Anything else you can tell me? Anything at all?” As a psychologist she simply could not allow herself to believe in paranormal activity; as a woman who loved this boy herself, she believed every word.

“A fence … darkness … chain link, you know? Looking through it. Boxes. Blue boxes.”

“Train cars?”

“I don’t know.”

“Containers. Ship containers?”

“I can’t see it clearly. Blue boxes…. fence … darkness.”

“I’ll call,” Daphne said. “If we find out anything, I’ll call.”

Emily Richland was still crying as Daphne hung up the phone.

One hell of an act indeed, if that’s what it was.

She needed no more courage than that call. She lifted the receiver and dialed Boldt’s cellular.

“Check it out,” Lofgrin said proudly, hoisting a pair of graphs up for Boldt to compare. “The one on the left was downloaded from the FBI database I told you about, every goddamn kind of ink manufactured. The one on the right is the chromatograph of the ink used on the Scholar’s threats.” The match, though not perfect, was unmistakable.

Boldt said, in a voice that sounded more like a prayer, “Tell me that two hundred thousand people in Seattle don’t own this same pen.”

“They don’t, not by a long shot. Maybe it helps us locate him. It’s from a company in St. Louis that specializes in cheap custom pens: giveaways. The kind that advertises in the back of magazines: Your logo here! ” Lofgrin was so excited he was shouting. “You’ve seen ’em: golf clubs, hardware stores, rental shops. You name it.”

“No, you name it,” Boldt said, turning the man’s phrase and sobering him some. “How big a field, Bernie?”

“We’re a long way from St. Louis, Lou. It’s not like a company like this would be flooded with Seattle orders.”

“How many Seattle clients?”

“How many? How should I know? That’s your job. I match the fucking graphs. That’s my job. It’s your phone call to make, not mine. And don’t expect miracles. Firms like this make a lot of models, you know? And it’s not like we know the model.”

“The shape, you mean?”

“Shape, size, color. All that would narrow the field.”

“ You make the call, Bernie. Wake someone up if you have to. Threaten them. I don’t care what you do. But get someone down to their records-tonight-right now! Every Seattle client, every customer.” Boldt took off quickly down the hallway.

“And what the fuck are you going to do?” the man called out indignantly. “I am not a detective!”

Without looking back, Boldt broke into a jog and shouted into the hallway, “I’m going to get a description of the pen for you. I’m going to get you the model.”

Kotch was already at work at the video monitor when Boldt entered the smoke-filled room. The big man waved the air. “Hasn’t anybody here heard that this building has been no smoking for about seven years?”

The offending cigarette dangled from Kotch’s pinched lips. “So arrest me.” He exhaled.

On the large monitor, Boldt saw a portion of the grainy video shot inside Garman’s rooming house. “Fast-forward,” Boldt ordered.

“I was just-”

Boldt interrupted, repeating the order. He steered him to the section of tape where the contents of the desktop were revealed. First the envelopes, then the cards. In the background, Boldt saw the tin can filled with pens and pencils. He directed the man to freeze-frame.

“Can you enlarge this?” Boldt asked.

“We’ve got some cool toys, Sergeant. We can enlarge anything, though we’ll lose resolution pretty fast on a tape this small.”

“Give me the pens and pencils,” Boldt said, pointing to the screen. Static sparked off the tip of his finger, and Boldt jumped back with the spark.

“A little tense, are we?” Kotch inquired.

The can of pens and pencils grew ever larger on the screen. What writing may have been on the pens was lost immediately, but it became quickly apparent that of the few items in the can, three of the pens were the same-button-operated ball points, short and thick. Cheap pens. Just what Lofgrin needed.

“Can you print that?”

“It’s not a very clear image. I can doctor it up some.”

“No time. Print it. It’s gorgeous. It’s exactly what we need.”

“The pens?” Kotch questioned earnestly. “You’re interested in a bunch of junk pens?”

“Interested? With those pens, the Scholar just signed his own death warrant.”

The printer began to sing.

Boldt smiled for the first time in days.

Ben pressed his face closer to the chain link fence outside the automated gate to the U-Stor-It facility, his fingers laced through the metal webbing. The Face had evidently used the keypad to open the gate, which was now closed. And although Ben was curious to find out where the guy had gone to, once inside, his eye was not on the endless rows of storage units but on the pay phone outside the door marked OFFICE.

That pay phone called to him. Up and over the fence, a quick run across the open pavement (that to Ben seemed a mile wide), and over to that phone. Call Daphne. Tell her the Face was here at the U-Stor-It on Airport Way. A hero. Back over the fence. Ride like hell. A plan. Pretty simple at that. Hardest part would be the climb over, and again on the way back, but he could climb sixty-foot trees so why not a ten-foot-high chain link fence?