Blaze

The news came on. He listened carefully and heard that somebody had called the Gerard home demanding two thousand dollars in ransom. This made Blaze frown. Then the newscaster said a teenage boy had made the call from a phone booth in Wyndham. The police had traced the call. When they caught him, he said he had been playing a prank.

Tell em it’s a prank all night, they’ll still put you away, kiddo, Blaze thought. Kidnapping is hot.

He frowned, thought, cut out more letters. The weather forecast came on. Fair and a little colder. Snow on the way soon.

I HAVE THE BABY. IF YOU WANT TO SEE HIM ALIVE AGAIN

If you want to see him alive again, what? What? Confusion rose in Blaze’s mind. Call collect, operators are standing by? Stand on your head and whistle Dixie? Send two boxtops and fifty cents in coin? How did you go about getting the dough without getting caught?

“George? I can’t remember this part.”

No answer.

He put his chin in one hand and really put on his thinking cap. He had to be very cool. Cool like George. Cool like John Cheltzman had been that day in the bus station when they had been running away to Boston. You had to use your nut. You had to use your old bean, old bean.

He would have to pretend he was part of a gang, that was for sure. Then they couldn’t grab him when he picked up the swag. If they did, he’d tell them they had to let him go or his partners would kill the kid. Run a bluff. Hell, run a con.

“That’s how we roll,” he whispered. “Right, George?”

He crumpled up his second try and searched out more letters, scissoring them into neat blocks.

OUR GANG HAS THE BABY. IF YOU WANT TO SEE HIM ALIVE AGAIN

That was good. That was right on the jack. Blaze admired it for awhile, then went to check the baby. The baby was asleep. His head was turned, and one small fist was tucked under his cheek. His lashes were very long, and darker than his hair. Blaze liked him. He never would have said a rug-monkey could be good-looking, but this one was.

“You’re a stud, Joey,” he said, and then ruffled the baby’s hair. His hand was bigger than the baby’s whole head.

Blaze went back to the scattered magazines and newspapers and scraps on the table. He deliberated awhile, nibbling a little of his flour-water paste as he did. Then he got back to work.

OUR GANG HAS THE BABY. IF YOU WANT TO SEE HIM ALIVE AGAIN GET $$ 1 MILLION $$ IN UNMARKED BILLS. PUT MONEY IN BRIFCASE. BE READY TO GO ON A MOMENTS NOTISE. SINCIRELY YOURS,

THE KIDNAPERS OF JOE GERARD 4.

There. It told them some stuff, but not too much. And it would give him some time to think out a plan.

He found a dirty old envelope and put his letter in it, then cut out letters on the front to say:

THE GERARDS

OCOMA

IMPORTANT!

He didn’t know exactly how he was going to mail it. He didn’t want to leave the baby with George again, and he didn’t dare use the hot Ford, but he didn’t want to mail it in Apex, either. Everything would have been so much easier with George. He could have just stayed home and babysat while George took care of the brain stuff. He wouldn’t mind feeding Joe and changing him and all that stuff. He wouldn’t mind a bit. He sort of liked it.

Well, it didn’t matter. The mail wouldn’t go until tomorrow morning anyway, so he had time to make a plan. Or remember George’s.

He got up and checked the baby again, wishing the TV wasn’t bust. You got good ideas from the TV sometimes. Joe was still sleeping. Blaze wished he would wake up so that he could play with him. Make him grin. The kid looked like a real boy when he grinned. And he was dressed now, so Blaze could goof with him and not worry about getting pissed on.

Still, he was asleep and there was no help for that. Blaze turned off the radio and went into the bedroom to make plans, but fell asleep himself.

Before drifting off, it occurred to him that he felt sort of good. For the first time since George died, he felt sort of good.

Chapter 14

HE WAS AT A CARNIVAL— maybe the Topsham Fair, where the boys from Hetton House were allowed to go once each year on the rickety old blue bus — and Joe was on his shoulder. He felt foglike terror as he walked down the midway, because pretty soon they would spot him and it would be all over. Joe was awake. When they passed one of the funny mirrors that stretched you thin, Blaze saw the kid goggling at everything. Blaze kept walking, shifting Joe from one shoulder to the other when he got heavy, keeping an eye out for the cops at the same time.

All around him, the carnival rolled in unhealthy neon majesty. From the right came the amplified beat of a pitchman’s voice: “C’mon over here, got it all over here, six beautiful girls, half a dozen honeys, they all come straight from Club Diablo in Boston, these girls will tease you please you make you think you’re in Gay Paree!”

This ain’t no place for a kid, Blaze thought. This is the last place in the world for a little kid.