“Where are we going?”
Where were we going? Until that moment I hadn’t really thought about it, what with all the swirl going on. But Floon had a point. I couldn’t take him to jail because that would involve too much time explaining to the people down at the station house and I had no time to explain.
“Don’t you want to know what I was doing on the computer, McCabe?”
“No and be quiet.” Where the hell was I going to take him?
The door flew open and little me appeared. “The cops are here.”
“Where? Didn’t I tell you to go outside?”
“I did, Mr. Stupid. But now the cops are out there. That’s all I came in to tell you. I thought you’d want to know. They brought two cars and now they’re talking to that librarian across the street.”
Thinking out loud I said, “Maeve must have called them.”
With a taunt on his face and in his voice Floon asked, “Are you going to have me arrested, McCabe?”
“I’d rather have you stuffed. Now shut up. I have to figure this out.”
The two regarded me as if I knew what I was doing. Floon was impassive, the boy very happy and excited. I hadn’t ordered him out again which meant that for the time being he could stick around for whatever was coming next.
As fast as my limping head could think, I tried sorting through my options. If we stayed in the library, Bill Pegg would eventually assume some kind of hostage situation was going on and take the appropriate steps. That did not bode well. I liked Bill very much but knew he had dreams of glory, most of them unfulfilled. Here was a chance for him to take charge big-time but that was not necessarily a good thing.
A simpler way would be for us to just walk out of the library. But both choices led to the same thing—hours wasted explaining and sorting this bizarre situation out afterward. I could not afford to waste that time.
“What about the basement?” Junior asked but his question didn’t register in me until some beats had passed.
“Huh?”
“The basement. What if we snuck out of here through the door in the basement?”
“Why sneak?”
“Because the cops are outside, dumbbell! Jeez, you want them to catch you or something?”
“Who is this child, McCabe?”
“He’s my son.”
“I am not!”
“Well, close enough. How do you know about the basement?”
“Because I know a lot about this place. I have pretty well explored everything around here. Me and this guy, we found a way to sneak out downstairs through a fire door—”
Scorched brain notwithstanding, I remembered what the boy was talking about, remembered jimmying the lock on a door downstairs when I was his age. Al Salvato and me. I spoke that name before I had a chance to think, “Al Salvato.”
Little Fran nodded because it was obvious that’s who he was talking about.
And he was right—we could easily sneak out that door and after a few strategic lefts and rights, be gone from this neighborhood in five minutes.
“You’re a smart kid. And since you came up with the idea, why don’t you lead the way?”
“Okay.”
I took Floon’s arm and pushed him in front of me. He didn’t resist, which was clever, because if he had I would have hit him on the head again. We left the computer room and, turning right down the hall, walked till we got to a wide staircase. The kid took it two quick steps at a time. Us old men were slower but we made it to the bottom too.
The kid waved for us to follow him. “That door’s over here.”
“How ‘bout this quick-witted boy, Floon? He’s actually going to get us out of here. No wonder I’m so smart—I started young.”
“What the hell are you talking about, McCabe?”
“Never mind. Just follow that little genius.”
As I was reaching out to push the door open, at the last moment I noticed a sign on the wall saying it was an emergency fire exit. When it was opened an audible signal would be heard.
I assumed that meant some kind of horrendous screeching racket to scare off any rascals trying to weasel out of the library with stolen books. Any horrendous screeching racket would not help my plan to tiptoe out of here and make a stealthy escape.
“May I make a suggestion?” Floon didn’t wait for permission. “When you open that door it will set off an electronic alarm. Just in case you didn’t read the schild there.”
“It’s called a plaque, Floon, or a sign. Not a schild. I already know there’s an alarm.”
“Yes, well, I would guess that if you looked a bit you’d find a wire to it that you could disconnect.”
That made me suspicious—especially because he spoke in such an even tone. “Why do you care if we get out of here now?”
“Because I don’t want to be arrested. There are other things I would rather be doing than sitting in a jail cell.”
“You won’t be doing anything until I’m finished with you. And then I’ll put you in jail myself.”
The boy scowled at us, hands on hips. “Are you two guys going to talk all day or are we getting out of here? Come on, let’s go!”
It took five minutes to locate the wire and with a snick of the boy’s fat brown Buck pocketknife, seconds to cut it. Then we were outta there and the door was banging shut behind us. We walked up a small hill, down past a thin creek, looked back, and the library was gone. And so was my uncertainty about where to go.
“Take a right here.”
“May I ask where we’re going?” Every time Floon spoke it came out sounding both pedantic and amused. It was a voice you wanted to hit with a baseball bat.
“To George’s house.”
“Why? We were just there!” For the first time his voice cracked into something annoyed and vaguely human.
The boy poked me in the side. “Who’s George?”
“Junior, I really am grateful to you for helping in the library. But if you’re going to come along now, I don’t want any questions—nothing, not one. There’s too much happening and my head’s jam-packed. Questions from you won’t help. Capice?”
“Yeah. I capice.”
“Good. But I’ll answer you this one time: We’re going to a friend of mine’s house. His name is George and he’s very smart. I want him to help me figure something out. Okay? That’s the whole plan.”
We walked across the familiar backyards and back streets of Crane’s View. A little boy leading two middle-aged men. Sometimes he skipped along smiling to himself, alone in his own world. Watching him, I tried to remember pieces of that world where I’d once lived: Good & Plenty licorice candies, bunkbeds in my bedroom, Early Wynn pitching for the Cleveland Indians, Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine, the Beatles singing “I Wanna Hold Your Hand,” the Three Stooges on TV. I walked on, remembering the delicious trivia that had filled those days. Some of it came back but so much was gone. That part made me very sad. I wished there would have been time to sit down with the boy and ask him to tell me about his life, my life. Then I could have known it again in detail and carried that knowledge with me for as much time as I had left.
Sometimes the boy looked confused because the town he’d known forty years ago was not the same as today’s. Houses he knew were not where they were supposed to be. Houses were not supposed to be where they were. The layout looked different. Who were all these strangers? No one knows a small town like the kids living there. They live on the streets, memorize the residents, the cars, and what’s in the store windows. In the summer when school is out they have little else to do. Stay home bored or be out and around in the town. So they stand by their bikes and watch as cars get put up on the rack for a lube job at the gas station, or people moving in and out of the houses. Kids can tell you about a new member of the community before anyone else can. How many children do they have, what kind of dog, the color of their furniture, and if the husband yells at the wife.