Kali and I were so happy that we decided to let Inge go to a Halloween party she was invited to and have an adventure of our own.”
“Gabe, I need to talk to my daughter.”
“When you’re angry, all the music goes from your voice, Robin. Mummy’s a little upset, Kali. You can say hi to her, but remember we can’t tell her where we are. That’s a secret.”
“Hi, Mummy,” Kali says. She is at the center of this drama, but her voice is bubbly and unconcerned. “Gabe bought me a new game of Candy Land. We played it up at the lake, ’member?”
Robin’s tone is urgent.
“Listen to me, Kali. You have to get away from Gabe. Start screaming and run.”
There’s a bell-like sound in the background on Gabe’s end of the line. I raise a finger and mouth the word listen to Robin. She furrows her brow in concentration but shakes her head. She can’t identify what we’re hearing.
Gabe comes back on the line.
“My turn to talk, Kali,” he says. “Mummy doesn’t understand that we’re playing two games tonight. You and I are playing Candy Land, and all of us are playing hide and seek. Mummy is It. It’s not fair for the person who’s It to tell us to scream and run, because as soon as she finds us, the game is over.”
Robin’s composure shatters.
“Gabe, please…”
“Your voice is full of music again,” Gabe says. “I’ve never been able to resist your music. Kali wants us to sing a song for you. I want to do that too. We want you to remember how much we loved you.”
Suddenly I know this isn’t a game. This is for real.
“Gabe, you’re not going to-”
He cuts me off. “Kali, let’s sing for Mummy.”
Gabe’s voice is a pleasant tenor, and Kali’s little girl voice is fresh and tuneful. They sing a duet: “You Are My Sunshine.” By the time they finish, Nova is in tears, and my throat is thick. Robin is frantic.
“Kali, listen to me,” she says. “This isn’t a game. Gabe isn’t your friend. He’s going to hurt you. You have to get away.”
“She can’t hear you, Robin,” Gabe says. “I have the phone, and you won’t be talking to Kali anymore because you cheat. You don’t play by the rules. I’m not surprised but I am disappointed. I had hoped that perhaps since this was the last time the three of us would be together…”
My heart is pounding. I can barely form the words.
“Gabe, don’t kill that little girl.”
“Trust me, Charlie,” he says gently. “It’s for the best.”
“How can killing a six-year-old child be ‘for the best’?”
Gabe sounds very tired. “There are circumstances…”
I find myself shouting.
“What circumstances could possibly justify taking a child’s life?”
“There aren’t any.” Robin’s voice is fervent. “Gabe, stop this. I want my daughter. I won’t press charges. I give you my word.”
“Even the music in your voice won’t sway me this time, my dark star. There’ve been too many words, and I remember them all- especially the ones at the end. You told me I ‘no longer meet your needs.’ I wept, but your eyes, ‘those silent tongues of love’ Cervantes wrote about, were cold. You were my whole existence, Robin.”
“People fall out of love,” Robin says tightly.
“I didn’t,” Gabe says. “When I promised to love you till the day I died, I meant it. In less than half an hour my birthday and my life will be over. I will die loving you, and that, my beloved, is a great gift.”
Robin’s body is shaking, and when she speaks, there is a quiver in her splendid voice. “Stop this Gabe. I want my daughter back.”
“Why? So that one day you can tell her that she no longer meets your needs? For the past six months, I’ve spent every waking hour trying to figure out what happened between us. I’ve talked to a colleague of ours in psychiatry who knows you. In fact, he was one of your conquests. He says you have a fear of being abandoned-that’s why you always leave other people before they can leave you.”
“I will never leave Kali.”
“Oh, but you will. Mastery is as necessary to you as oxygen. One day, you’ll decide that Kali hasn’t turned out quite the way you hoped-she’s too tall or too awkward or too dull or just inconvenient. You’ll tell her it’s time she moved along- that you’ve found this great boarding school for her. She’ll plead with you. She’ll promise to change. She’ll vow to do whatever it takes to become the person you want her to be. That’s when you deliver the coup de grace and tell her that there is nothing she can do that will make you love her again. There is simply no place for her in your life.”
“Gabe, I swear to you…”
“You’re not trustworthy, Robin. You’ve broken your word before.” There’s no anger in Gabe’s voice-just sorrow. “You offer Kali death by a thousand cuts,” he says. “I offer her oblivion. You tell me which is the real act of love?”
Robin stands so abruptly that her headset is pulled off and clatters noisily onto the desk.
“For God’s sake,” she says. “Why isn’t anybody doing anything?”
Nova’s voice over the talkback is urgent. “Help her, Charlie. We’ll go to music. Dr. Harris chose Verdi’s Requiem when we did the pre-interview. We’ll play the opening.”
“Got it,” I say. I turn back to Gabe and our other 150,000 listeners.
“We all need a chance to let our pulse rates slow. Verdi’s Requiem-the choice of our guest expert tonight-should do the job.”
“That will be pleasant,” Gabe says. “Kali and I like Verdi, don’t we?”
I can hear Kali’s giggle. So can Robin. She buries her face in her hands. I flip off the button that controls my microphone and move my chair closer to hers.
“I know this is hard,” I say, “but try to keep it together. Our producer has been on the phone with the police since we heard Kali’s voice. They figure Gabe’s using his cell phone, but they’re having difficulty tracking his location. You and Gabe were close. Where do you think he would he feel safe with Kali?”
Robin shrugs. “I don’t know-his new condo maybe. He gave me the address, but I didn’t put it in my book. The hospital will have it.” She frowns. “He wouldn’t take her there. He knows that’s the first place the authorities would look.”
“Was there someplace he and Kali liked to go?”
“Alligator Sam’s. It’s near my house. They have slides, play structures, toys-the kinds of things children enjoy. Gabe said they have a little coffee bar where parents can chat while their children play. Gabe and Kali loved it.”
“It’s late, Robin. A place for kids would be closed by now.”
“Maybe the hospital…? That was always like home to Gabe.”
“Which hospital?”
“Lakeshore.”
