Silent Night

14

Pete Cruise had been about to call it a day. He’d discovered where Cally Hunter lived when he tried to interview her after she was released from prison, and now he was hoping her brother would show up. But there’d been nothing to watch for hours except the on-again-off-again falling snow. Now at least it seemed to have stopped for good. The van that he knew was a police van was still parked across the street from Cally’s apartment, but probably all they were doing was monitoring her calls. The likelihood of Jimmy Siddons suddenly showing up at his sister’s house now was about the same as two strangers having matching DNA.

All the hours of hanging around Hunter’s building were a waste, Pete decided. From the time he’d seen Cally come home shortly before six, and the two detectives stop in around seven, it had been a big nothing.

He’d kept his powerful portable radio on the whole time he waited, switching between the police band, his station, WYME, and the WCBS news station. No word of Siddons at all. Shame about that missing kid.

When the ten o’clock news came on WYME, Pete thought for the hundredth time that the anchor in that slot sounded like a wimp. But she did have some real emotion when she talked about the missing seven-year-old. Maybe we need a missing kid every day, Pete thought sarcastically, then was immediately ashamed of himself.

There was a lot of activity in Hunter’s building, people coming and going. Many of the churches had moved up the midnight services to ten o’clock. No matter what time they schedule them, some people will always be late, Pete thought as he saw an elderly couple hurry from the building and turn up Avenue B. Probably heading for St. Emeric’s.

The woman who had brought Hunter’s kid home earlier was coming up the block. Was she headed for Hunter’s apartment? Cally planning to go out? he wondered.

Pete shrugged. Maybe Hunter had a late date or was going to church herself. Obviously, today wasn’t the day to get the story that was going to make his name as a reporter.

It’ll happen, Pete promised himself. I won’t always be working on this lousy ten-watt station. His buddy who worked at WNBC loved to ride Pete about his job. A favorite put-down was that the only audience for WYME were two cockroaches and three stray cats. “This is station Why-Me,” he’d joke.

Pete started his car. He was just about to pull out when a squad car raced down the block and stopped in front of Cally’s building.

Through narrowed eyes, Pete observed three men emerge. One he recognized as Jack Shore crossed the street and got into the van. Then in the light from the building entrance he could make out Mort Levy. He didn’t get a good look at the other one.

Something was breaking. Pete turned off the engine, suddenly interested again.

While she waited for Mort Levy, Cally took Gigi’s Christmas presents from their hiding place behind the couch and set them in front of the tree. The secondhand doll’s carriage didn’t look that bad, she decided, with the pretty blue satin coverlet and pillowcase. She’d put the baby doll she’d picked up for a couple of dollars last month in it, but it wasn’t nearly as cute as the one that she’d wanted to buy from the peddler on Fifth Avenue. That one had Gigi’s golden-brown hair and was wearing a blue party dress. If she hadn’t been looking for that peddler, she wouldn’t have seen the wallet, and the boy wouldn’t have followed her, and …

She put that thought aside. She was past feeling now. Carefully, she stacked the presents she’d wrapped with candy-cane paper: an outfit from The Gap-leggings and a polo shirt; crayons and a coloring book; some furniture for Gigi’s dollhouse. Everything, even the two pieces of the Gap outfit, was in separate boxes so at least it looked as though Gigi had a stack of gifts to open.

She tried to avoid looking at the largest package under the tree, the package that Gigi thought was their gift for Santa Claus.

Finally she phoned Aika. Aika’s grandchildren always went home to sleep, so she was sure she could come over and stay with Gigi in case the cops arrested Cally after she told them about Jimmy and the little boy.

Aika answered on the first ring. “Hello.” Her voice was filled with her normal warmth. If only they’d let Gigi stay with Aika if they put me in prison again, Cally thought. She swallowed over the lump in her throat, then said, “Aika, I’m in trouble. Can you come over in about half an hour and maybe stay overnight?”

“You bet I can.” Aika did not ask questions, simply clicked off.

As Cally replaced the receiver, the buzzer from the downstairs door resounded through the apartment.

“The switchboard’s on fire, Mrs. Dornan,” Leigh Ann Winick, the producer of Fox 5 Ten O’Clock News told Catherine as, carefully avoiding the floor cables, she and Michael left the broadcast area. “It looks as though everyone in our viewing area wants you to know that they’re rooting and praying for Brian and your husband.”

“Thank you.” Catherine tried to smile. She looked down at Michael. He had been trying so hard to keep up his spirits for her sake. It was only when she had listened to his on-camera plea that she had fully realized what this was doing to him.

Michael’s hands were in his pockets, his shoulders hunched under his ears. It was exactly the same posture Tom unconsciously fell into when he was worried about a patient. Catherine squared her own shoulders and put her arm around her older son as the door from the studio closed behind them.

The producer said, “Our operators are thanking everyone in your name, but is there anything else you’d like us to tell our audience?”

Catherine drew a deep breath, and her arm tightened around Michael. “I wish you’d tell them that we think I dropped my wallet, and that Brian apparently followed whoever picked it up. The reason he was so anxious to get it back is that my mother had just given me a St. Christopher medal that my father wore through World War II. My father believed the medal kept him safe. It even has a dent where a bullet glanced off it, a bullet that might have killed him. Brian has the same wonderful faith that St. Christopher or what he represents is going to take care of us again… and so do I. St. Christopher will carry Brian back to us on his shoulders, and he will help my husband get well.”

She smiled down at Michael. “Right, pal?”

Michael’s eyes were shining. “Mom, do you really believe that?”

Catherine drew a deep breath. I believe, Lord, help my unbelief. “Yes, I do,” she said firmly.

And maybe because it was Christmas Eve, for the first time, she really did.

15

State Trooper Chris McNally tuned out as Deidre Lenihan droned on about just seeing a St. Christopher medal, and how her father was named after St. Christopher. She was a well-meaning young woman, but every time he stopped for coffee at this McDonald’s, she seemed to be on duty and always wanted to talk.

Tonight Chris was too preoccupied with thoughts of getting home. He wanted to get at least some sleep before his kids got up to open all their Christmas presents. He also had been thinking about the Toyota he had just seen pull out in front of him. He’d been thinking of buying one himself, although he knew his wife wouldn’t want a brown one. A new car meant montly payments to worry about. He noticed the remnant of a bumper sticker on the