Mine

Rose didn't answer. She looked away from Laura because the woman's intense stare made her nervous.

'Every day can stretch and stretch until you feel as if it's never going to end,' Laura continued. 'You think the hours are stuck. And at night, when it's so quiet you can hear your heart beat… at night it's the worst. I've got an empty nursery in my house, and Mary Terrell has my son. I read your husband's book. I read about the Storm Front in it. He knows someone who was a member of the Storm Front, doesn't he?'

'That was a long time ago.'

'I realize that. But anything he could tell me might help the FBI, Rose. Anything. As it is, they're spinning their wheels. I can't take many more days of waiting for a phone call to tell me if my David is alive or dead. Can you understand that?'

Rose released a long breath and nodded, her face downcast. 'Yeah. When we heard about it, we had a long talk. We wondered how we'd feel if somebody took Mark Junior or Becca. It would be a heavy trip, that's for sure.' She looked up. 'Mark did know a woman who belonged to the Storm Front. But he didn't know Mary Terror. He doesn't know anything that would help you get your baby back.'

'How can you be sure about that? Maybe your husband knows something that he doesn't think is important, but it could be of real value. I don't think I have to tell you how desperate I am. You're a mother. You know how you'd feel.' She saw Rose frown, the lines deepening. 'Please. I need to find your husband and ask him some questions. I won't take much of his time. Will you tell me where I can find him?'

Rose's teeth worked her lower lip. She swirled the Red Zinger around her teacup, and then she said, 'Yeah. Okay. There's a phone number, but I didn't give it to you because they don't like to go out and track down the custodians. I mean, it's a big place.'

'Where does your husband work?'

Rose told her where, and how to get there. Laura finished her tea, said thank you, and left the house. At the front door Rose wished her peace, and the chimes stirred in the chill breeze.

Rock City was perched atop Lookout Mountain. It was not a suburb of Chattanooga, but rather a tourist attraction of walkways winding between huge, wind-chiseled boulders, a waterfall plummeting from a sheer cliff, and rock gardens with benches for the weary. Signs with bearded elves pointed out the admission gate and the parking lot. On such a cold day, even with the sun shining, the lot was all but empty. Laura paid her money in a building where Indian arrowheads and Confederate caps were on sale, and she was told by the clerk that Mark Treggs was probably out sweeping the path near the Swinging Bridge. She started off, following the walkway over, around, and sometimes even through the center of gargantuan rocks, the denuded bones of Lookout Mountain. She easily got through a crevice called Fatman's Squeeze, and she realized she was losing the weight of pregnancy. The pathway took her up into the sunlight again, out of the freezing shadows of the stones, and she at last saw the Swinging Bridge ahead of her. There was no one on the path, though. She crossed the bridge, which indeed did creak and swing, a gorge full of rocks about sixty feet below. She continued along the path, her hands thrust into the pockets of her overcoat. She didn't see anyone else anywhere. One thing she noticed, though: the walkways couldn't have been cleaner. And then she came around a curve and she heard it: the high, birdlike notes of a pennywhistle.

Laura followed the music. In another moment she found him. He was sitting cross-legged atop a boulder, his rake and broom leaning against the stone, and he was playing a pennywhistle and staring toward a vast panorama of pine woods and blue sky.

'Mr. Treggs?' she said, standing at the boulder's base.

He kept playing. The music was slow and gentle, and sad in a way. A pennywhistle, Laura thought, was an instrument played in circuses by clowns with tears painted on their cheeks. 'Mr. Treggs?' she repeated a little louder.

The music stopped. Mark Treggs took the pennywhistle from his mouth and looked down at her. He had a long dark-brown beard peppered with gray and his hair hung over his shoulders, a blue baseball cap on his head. Under thick, gray-flecked brows, his large, luminous hazel eyes peered at Laura from behind wire-framed granny glasses. 'Yes?'

'My name is Laura Clayborne. I've come from Atlanta to find you.'

Mark Treggs squinted, as if trying to get her into focus. 'I don't… think I know…'

'Laura Clayborne,' she said again. 'Mary Terrell stole my baby twelve days ago.'

His mouth opened, but he didn't say anything.

'I read Burn This Book, 'she went on. 'You talked about the Storm Front. You said you knew someone who belonged to it. I've come to ask you -'

'Oh,' he said. It was a boyish voice that did not go with the gray. 'Oh, wow.'

'For help,' Laura finished.

'I saw you on the tube! My old lady and I both saw you! We were talking about you just last night!' He scrambled down off the boulder with surefooted ease. He was wearing a brown uniform and a jacket with Rock City stenciled in red on one breast pocket and Mark on the other. Treggs stood about six three and was as skinny as a spider monkey, his face all beard, wild eyebrows, and goggly eyes behind the glasses. 'Man, what a trip! I swear, we were talking about you!'

'I saw Rose. She told me where to find you.' The cup, she thought. The face on it was his.

'You went to my house? Wow!'

'Mr. Treggs? Listen to me. I need your help. You know someone who belonged to the Storm Front. Is that right?'

His goofy smile began to fade. He blinked a few times, regaining his equilibrium. 'Oh,' he said. 'That's why you're here?'

'Yes. I read your latest book.'

'My book. Right.' He nodded, and slid the pennywhistle into his back pocket. 'Listen… excuse me, but I've got to get back to work.' He retrieved the rake and broom. 'I can't sit around too long. They get mad.' He started to move away.

Laura followed him. 'Wait a minute! Didn't you hear what I said?' She reached out, grasped his shoulder, and stopped his gawky, long-legged strides. 'I'm asking you for your help!'

'I can't help you,' he said flatly. 'Sorry.' Again he began striding away.

Laura kept pace, a surge of anger rising and whorls of red in her cheeks. 'Mr. Treggs! Wait, please! Just give me one minute!'

He kept going, his speed picking up.

'Wait! Just hear me out!'

Faster still.

'I SAID WAIT, DAMN IT!' Laura shouted, and she grabbed Mark Treggs by the left arm, spun him around with all her strength, and slammed his back against a smooth boulder. He gave a little grunt, and the rake and broom slid from his hand. His eyes had grown larger, owlish, and frightened.

'Please,' he said. 'I can't stand violence.'

'Neither can I! But by God my son was stolen from me by a murderess, and you're going to tell me what I want to know!' She shook him. 'Can you dig it, man?'

He didn't answer. Then, quietly: 'Yeah, I can dig it.'

'Good.' Laura released him, but she blocked his way so he couldn't escape. 'You knew a Storm Fronter. Who was it?'

Treggs looked around. 'Okay, come on! Where're the pigs hiding? You brought 'em, didn't you?'

'No police. Nobody but me.'

'Well, it doesn't matter anyhow.' He shrugged. 'I don't care if you're wired. So I was in a commune for a few months with Bedelia Morse. Didi to her friends. So what? I didn't hang out with the Storm Premiers, so you can put that in the pig pipe and let 'em smoke it.'

'What happened to Bedelia Morse? Did she die at the Shootout in New Jersey?'

'No, she got away. Listen, that's all I know. I was in a commune with Didi and about eight other people back in 'sixty-nine, before she got into the Storm Front. We were in South Carolina, and we broke up after four months because everybody got tired of getting rousted by the local pigs. End of story.'

'Didn't you know her at Berkeley?'

'Uh-uh. She didn't go to Berkeley. She got hooked on the Storm Front when she went to New York. Listen, I