“And now you’re looking a second time? A bit ironic.” He shook his head at that irony. “Well, I don’t know what she was like then, but now? Amanda’s a real cool kid. Maybe too cool, you know? I never met anyone of any age so self-possessed. I mean, to be comfortable in your own skin is a rare quality in a sixty-year-old, never mind a sixteen-year-old. Amanda knows exactly who she is.”
“And who is that?”
“I don’t follow.”
“We’ve heard about Amanda’s cool from a lot of people, and you describe her as knowing exactly who she is. My question is-who is she?”
“She’s whoever she needs to be. She’s adaptability personified.”
“And Sophie?”
“Sophie is… pliable. She’ll follow any philosophy if it brings her closer to the group-think of the room. Amanda
“You admire her.”
“ ‘Admire’ is a little strong, but I’ll admit she’s an impressive kid. Nothing affects her. Nothing can change her will. And she’s sixteen years old.”
“That’s impressive,” I said. “I wish, though, that just one person I talked to mentioned something about her that was goofy or warm or, I don’t know, messy.”
“That’s not Amanda.”
“Apparently not.”
“What about a kid named Zippo? You ever hear of him?”
“Sophie’s boyfriend. I think his real name is, like, David Lighter. Or Daniel. I can’t be positive on that one.”
“When’s the last time you saw Sophie?”
“Two weeks ago, maybe three.”
“Amanda?”
“Around the same time.”
“Zippo?”
He drained his drink. “Christ.”
“What?”
“It’s been three weeks on him, too. They all…” He looked at us.
“Vanished,” Angie said.
Our daughter climbed the jungle gym in the center of the Ryan Playground. It had been snowing since sundown. There was a foot of sand below the jungle gym but I kept my hand nearby anyway.
“So, Detective,” Angie said.
“Yes, Junior Detective.”
“Oh, I’m Junior Detective, huh? Wow, there really is a glass ceiling.”
“You’re Junior Detective for one week. After that I’ll give you a promotion.”
“Based on what?”
“Solid casework and a certain nocturnal inventiveness after lights-out.”
“That’s harassment, you cad.”
“Last week that harassment made you forget your name.”
“Mommy, why would you forget your name? Did you hit your head?”
“Nice,” Angie said to me. “No, Mommy didn’t hit her head. But you’re going to fall if you don’t pay attention. Watch that bar. There’s ice there.”
My daughter rolled her eyes at me.
“Listen to the boss,” I said.
“So what’d we learn today?” Angie asked me as Gabby went back to climbing.
“We learned that Sophie is probably the girl who talked to the police and said she was Amanda. We learned Amanda is very cool and collected. We learned Sophie is not. We learned five people walked into some room, two died, but four walked out. Whatever that means. We learned that there’s a kid in this world named Zippo. We learned it’s possible Amanda was abducted, because no one thinks she’d run away with so much to stay in school for.” I looked over at Angie. “I’m out. You cold?”
Her teeth chattered. “I never wanted to leave the house. How’d we get Edna the Eskimo for a kid?”
“Irish genes.”
“Daddy,” Gabby said, “catch me.”
Two seconds after she said it, she pitched herself off the bar and I caught her in my arms. She wore earmuffs and a hooded pink down coat and about four layers of underclothing, including thermal leggings-so much clothing the little body wrapped inside felt like a snap pea in its pod.
“Your cheeks are cold,” I said.
“No they’re not.”
“Uh, okay.” I hoisted her up onto my shoulders and gripped her ankles. “Mommy’s cold.”
“Mommy’s always cold.”
“That’s because Mommy’s Italian,” Angie said as we walked out of the playground.
“PR can’t take her tomorrow-dentist-but she can take her the next couple days.”
“Cool.”
“So what’re you going to do tomorrow?” Angie asked me. “Watch that ice.”
I stepped over the ice patch as we reached the crosswalk. “You don’t want to know.”
Chapter Fourteen
Helene McCready’s current abode was, on the surface, a hell of a step up from the Dorchester three-decker apartment where, until recently, she’d seen fit to poorly raise her daughter. She and Kenny Hendricks lived at 133 Sherwood Forest Drive in Nottingham Hill, a gated community two miles off Route 1, in Foxboro. All I knew about Foxboro was that the Patriots played there eight times a year and it wasn’t too far from the outlet mall in Wrentham. After I accessed those two factoids, I was out. End of list.
It turned out Foxboro was also home to half a dozen adorably named gated condo communities. En route to Nottingham Hill, I also passed Bedford Falls, Juniper Springs, Wuthering Heights, and Fragrant Meadows. All, as mentioned, gated. I couldn’t understand what the gates were for, though; Foxboro had an extremely low crime rate. Other than a parking space on game day, I had no idea what they’d want to steal out here, unless there was a sudden shortage of barbecue utensils or power mowers.
The gate at Nottingham Hill wasn’t hard to circumvent, since there was no gatekeeper. A sign on the kiosk read DURING DAYLIGHT HOURS, PRESS *958 FOR SECURITY. A couple of car lengths past the kiosk, the main road, Robin Hood Boulevard, forked. Four arrow signs at the left fork directed me to Loxley Lane, Tuck Terrace, Scarlett Street, and Sherwood Forest Drive. The road was straight, and what lay ahead appeared to be the kind of middle- class cookie-cutter subdivision I’d expected.
To the right, however, the arrows promised to lead me to Archer Avenue, Little John Lane, Yorkshire Road, and Maid Marian’s Meeting House, but the road led only to a collection of sand mounds with a lone yellow backhoe sitting atop one. Somewhere during the Nottingham Hill development boom, the boom had lowered.
I took the left fork and found 133 Sherwood Forest Drive at the end of a cul-de-sac. The backyards around here were the same tan sand as the mounds where Maid Marian’s Meeting House was supposed to stand, and both 131
