She shivered. A cold wet wind was blowing through the windows of the tree house. Mrs. Carlson's voice could no longer be heard. I felt uneasy about keeping the girl away from her mother. But I didn't want to let her go until she had told me everything she could.
I squatted on my heels in front of her. 'Stella, do you think Tommy's appointment that Saturday night had to do with his musician friends?'
`No. He would have told me if it had. It was more of a secret than that.'
`Did he say so?'
`He didn't have to. It was something secret and terribly important. He was terribly excited.'
`In a good way or a bad way?'
`I don't know how you tell the difference. He wasn't afraid, if that's what you mean.'
`I'm trying to ask you if he was sick.'
`Sick?'
`Emotionally sick.'
`No. I - That's foolish.'
`Then why did his father have him put away?'
`You mean, put away in a mental hospital?' She leaned toward me, so close I could feel her breath on my face.
`Something like that - Laguna Perdida School. I didn't mean to tell you, and I'm going to ask you not to tell your parents.'
`Don't worry, I'll never tell them anything. So that's where he is! Those hypocrites!'
Her eyes were fixed and wet. `You said he was in danger. Are they trying to cut out his frontal lobe like in Tennessee Williams?'
`No. He was in no danger where he was. But he escaped from the place, the night before last, and fell into the hands of thieves. Now, I'm not going to load your mind with any more of this. I'm sorry it came out.'
`Don't be.'
She gave me a second glimpse of the woman she was on her way to becoming. `If it's happening to Tommy, it's just like it was happening to me.'
Her forefinger tapped through nylon at the bone between her little breasts. `You said he fell into the hands of thieves. Who are they?'
`I'm trying to answer that question, in a hurry. Could they be his friends from The Barroom Floor?'
She shook her head. `Are they holding him prisoner or something?'
`Yes. I'm trying to get to them before they do something worse. If you know of any other contacts he had in his other life, particularly underworld contacts-' `No. He didn't have any. He didn't have another life, really. It was just talk, talk and music.'
Her lips were turning blue. I had a sudden evil image of myself a heavy hunched figure seen from above in the act of tormenting a child who was already tormented. A sense went through me of the appalling ease with which the things you do in a good cause can slip over into bad.
`You'd better go home, Stella.'
She folded her arms. `Not until you tell me everything. I'm not a child.'
`But this is confidential information. I didn't intend to let any of it out. If it got to the wrong people, it would only make things worse.'
She said with some scorn: `You keep beating around the bush, like Dad. Is Tommy being held for ransom?'
`Yes, but I'm pretty sure it's no ordinary kidnapping. He's supposed to have gone to these people of his own free will.'
`Who said so?'
`One of them.'
Her clear brow puckered. `Then why would Tommy be in any danger from them?'
`If he knows them,' I said, `they're not likely to let him come home. He could identify them.'
`I see.'
Her eyes were enormous, taking in all at once the horror of the world and growing dark with it. `I was afraid he was in some awful jam. His mother wouldn't tell me anything. I thought maybe he'd killed himself and they were keeping it quiet.'
`What made you think that?'
'Tommy did. He called me up and I met him here in the tree house the morning after the accident. I wasn't supposed to tell anyone. But you've been honest with me. He wanted to see me one more time - just as friends, you know - and say goodbye forever. I asked him if he was going away, or what he planned to do. He wouldn't tell me.'
`Was he suicidal?'
`I don't know. I was afraid that that was what it all meant. Not hearing from him since, I got more and more
