Danny laughed. 'Yeah, right,' he said. 'I guess she's just glad to have me back.' Shelly was nodding, her face in the pillow. Danny looked somewhat at ease. I knew that likely wouldn't last long.
'My mom told me you got in trouble a while ago,'
Danny said. 'She looked you up in the newspapers when she found out you were coming. Was she telling the truth?
Were you in trouble?'
I felt the air rush from my lungs. I nodded. 'Yeah, she's telling the truth.'
'What did you do?'
I took a breath. 'Some people thought I hurt someone,' I said.
Danny looked at me, riveted.
'Did you?'
'Not on purpose,' I said.
'What did it feel like?'
I thought for a moment, then said, 'Probably a little like what you're going through. I felt like a stranger everywhere I went. Like nobody knew who I really was, they just saw what they read about or watched on TV.'
'That's what'll happen to me, right? People will think I'm some freak weirdo when they don't even know who I am.'
'They'll think that for a little while. Then it's up to you to prove them wrong.'
'I don't see why they need me to prove anything,' he said quietly. 'It's not like I'm a different person or something.'
I couldn't say this to Danny, but no matter what he or
Shelly wanted to believe, he was a different person.
Scandals resonated for a long time. Perceptions died hard.
Danny took a celery stalk, munched on it, leafy threads stuck between misaligned teeth. Shelly watched approv-60
Jason Pinter ingly. Danny would need braces, that was for sure. No escaping that part of adolescence.
'I don't remember the house being so clean,' Danny said. 'And the color on the walls outside used to be gross.'
'I had it repainted a few years ago,' Shelly said. She turned to me. 'I wanted things to be clean in case…in case my boy ever came back. I wanted him to know things would be different.'
'You never lost hope, did you?' I asked.
'Never.'
'Do you think things will be different?' I asked Shelly.
'For Danny and your family?'
She gave me a smile, weaker than she likely thought it came off.
'Yes, they will. For the first time I truly know my babies will be safe.'
Danny and I both looked at her, wondering just how she could be so certain.
5
I listened to the recording of my interview with Daniel on the ride back to the city. I tried to focus as much on Danny
Linwood's cadences, his voice inflections, as what he actually said. I'd spoken to abducted children before, as well as men and women responsible for kidnapping children.
The children were always withdrawn, as if a piece of their soul had been sucked out. Only they never knew why. The luckier ones, the ones that were found quicker, had withdrawn into a shallower hole. Eventually they could rejoin society, restart their lives. The ones like Daniel, who were removed for years, they weren't so lucky. It was fortunate enough they beat the tremendous odds to survive, but more than likely they'd be stuck in that hole their entire lives. They would spend as much time scrabbling for footing as they did living. With Daniel Linwood, it was as though four-plus years had simply been lopped off clean. No ragged edges to be caught on. Just a gaping hole that left barely a trace.
When Stavros dropped me at Rockefeller Plaza, I entered the Gazette and headed to my desk. First I would have the tape duplicated, then transcribed. I couldn't promise Daniel and Shelly that they would see my story before it ran, but I had given them my word that Daniel would be treated with respect. Right before I left, Shelly
Linwood told me that Paulina Cole had been calling every fifteen minutes, begging her to reconsider giving me the exclusive. Apparently Paulina promised to set Shelly up with the Dispatch 's parent company, which had subsidiaries in television, film and publishing. News would be the beginning. Film deals and book deals would follow. The money would come rolling in.
According to Paulina, 'The Linwoods will no longer be victims. They'll be a brand name for survival.'
Shelly said their family wanted no part of it. Once my story ran, what she wanted more than anything was for her children to lead normal lives. Shockingly, Haley Joel
Osment cast as Danny didn't fit in.
I sat down at my desk, checked my messages. There was one from Wallace asking me to stop by as soon as I got back. There was another from Jack O'Donnell asking if I wanted to grab a beer and a shot after work. Both sounded like great ideas.
I walked into Wallace's office, found the editor-in-chief balancing the phone in the crook of his neck while simultaneously typing on his keyboard. The receiver fell twice, and finally Wallace gave up, slamming it back in the cradle and offering a string of colorful profanities.
'You know they make earpieces for people just like you,' I said.
'No way. Next thing you know I'll have a chip implanted in my cerebellum instead of a laptop. I know I can't stop technology, but I can keep it from plowing me over like a Thoroughbred. I swear, this industry was more efficient before stupid Al Gore invented the Internet.'
'Hey, once the Atlantic swallows the city up, the
Internet will be the least of your concerns. So what's up?'
'You talked to the Linwoods?'
'I did,' I said, holding the tape recorder out for him.
'Fantastic.' He looked at his watch. 'How'd it go?'
'I got as much as you can expect from a ten-year-old who fell into a black hole and can't remember the last five years of his life. You get as much from looking at Shelly
Linwood's face as you do hearing the story. Just heartbreaking. Strange, though. The kid disappears for almost five years, yet talks and acts like your typical ten-year-old.
Nobody has any idea where Danny Linwood went, but somehow his body and mind developed like a normal adolescent boy's.'
Wallace looked a minimum of disturbed by this, more distracted if anything. I had to remember that Wallace had been in this industry for longer than I'd been alive. He'd seen atrocities like this day after day, year after year. My conscience hadn't calloused over the years. Stories like this still angered me.
'That's good work, Henry. I need thirty inches for tomorrow's page one. I swear, Ted Allen over at the
Dispatch is probably trying to bug this building as we speak to get what's on that tape.'
'Shelly Linwood told me Paulina Cole all but offered her body and soul in exchange for this interview.'
'Just what the world needs, another forty-year-old woman sleeping with a toddler. For the sake of Daniel's future and his sanity, he's lucky his mother picked us.'
'For Danny's sake, sir.'
'Danny?'
'That's what Daniel Linwood prefers to be called now. Danny.'
'I'm taking it this is a new development.'
'Shelly doesn't seem too keen on it.'
