Lost Boy Lost Girl

Another backward glance at Quentin Jester, who went to visible pains to look elsewhere. “Probably murdered a lot of people.”

Mark told Jimbo about the hidden corridors, and his exploration of the basement, his discovery of the trunk, and the stains soaked into the concrete floor. “That’s why nobody can stand to look at the place. Something terrible really did happen in there. Maybe he built that big wooden bed so he could torture them before he took them downstairs.”

“You couldn’t fit a grown-up woman into those straps,” Jimbo said, knowing more than he was willing to say. He could not understand why Mark seemed to be in such a bubbly mood.

“If they were small, you could.” His all but hidden internal mirth, which would have been visible only to Jimbo and perhaps his father, flickered for a moment into view. “And how about you, Sherlock. What’s this information you said you had?”

Jimbo felt as though he had been pushed to the end of a diving board and ordered to jump. “Most of the people on Michigan Street don’t have a clue about the place. All they know is, some people in the neighborhood got together to keep it from looking like a slum, and they mow the grass on the sides and in front every two weeks. They have a kind of a list, and all these guys take turns. A couple of women told me their husbands hate the place. They hope it’ll burn down one night. The Rochenkos were both home. That was one of the only two places where I got asked why I wanted to know about the house.”

“Where was the other one? Ah. I bet I know. So what did you say?”

Jimbo made a face. “I said I was thinking up a topic for a research paper I have to do next year. The Rochenkos told me to think about global warming. Mrs. Rochenko said she had a bad feeling about 3323, and I shouldn’t even look at it if I didn’t have to.”

“I bet they don’t look at it even when they’re mowing the lawn.” Mark stared at Jimbo, and Jimbo braced himself. “The other guy to ask why you were so curious was Old Man Hillyard, right?”

Jimbo nodded. “Old Man Hillyard saw us sneaking around the back yesterday, and he saw you going there this morning.”

Alarm bloomed in Mark’s eyes. “He’s not going to tell anybody, is he?”

“No, he’s not like that. Old Man Hillyard is different from the way we always thought.” Jimbo paused. “He’s pretty off the wall.”

“What did you tell him?”

“Same thing. Research project.”

“Did he believe you?”

“He asked me if I thought he was an idiot. He said, even if high schools assigned research papers in summer, I was the kind of kid who’d put off doing it until the last week of August.”

Mark laughed. After a moment Jimbo laughed, too.

“Okay, okay. So I told him that we were just really interested in the place, that’s all. And he said . . .”

“He said . . . ?”

“He said it was interesting that we were interested.”

Mark lifted his chin and opened his mouth just about wide enough to sip the air.

“It was especially interesting that you were interested in it.”

Mark’s head tilted, and his eyebrows went up. Jimbo had to say it now. It was either that or make up some lie.

“I hope you’re going to explain that to me.”

“Naturally, I asked him what he meant.” Jimbo paused again, searching for words.

Mark leaned forward. “Well?”

Jimbo inhaled. “The first part, you already know about. The man who lived in that house was a murderer.”

“No shit.”

“And the second part . . . is that he was probably related to your mom. Because they had the same last name. Before your mom married your dad.” Puzzled by the growing recognition visible in his friend’s face, Jimbo said, “Calendar? Like the months and the days, a calendar?”

“Kalendar,” Mark said. He spelled it out for Jimbo. “You saw it at the funeral home, remember?”

“I guess I didn’t really notice. But Old Man Hillyard said the murderer’s name was Joseph Kalendar, and he didn’t even know it was your mom’s maiden name until he went to your house and saw it on those cards. With the sunset and the Lord’s Prayer?”

“And?”

“And he was surprised, because Kalendar was such a bad guy. He killed all those women, and he murdered his own son. Old Man Hillyard knew these people!”

“Wow,” Mark said.

“I thought you were going to be upset. But you almost look like you’re happy to hear about Kalendar.”

“Of course I’m happy. You just told me what I needed to know. The guy’s name, and what he did. He and Mom were related. Maybe he was her brother!”

He gave Jimbo a look of pure wildness, his eyes bulging in their sockets. “Joseph Kalendar is the Dark Man. And he’s the reason my mom killed herself.”

“The Dark Man?”

“The man whose back is always turned. He’s the guy I saw at the top of Michigan Street.”

“What? You think he’s a ghost?”

Mark shook his head. “I think he’s more like what some people call a ghost.” He thought for a moment. “What happened to Joseph Kalendar?”

“He was sent to a mental hospital, and another inmate killed him.”

“I bet we can find out all about him on the Internet.”

Jimbo nodded, then thought of something else. “What do you mean, what some people call a ghost?”

Mark laughed and shook his head. “I mean, like—something left behind. Something real enough so sometimes you can see it.”

“Ican’t see it,” Jimbo said. “I mean, I couldn’t. That day in your kitchen, I didn’t see anyone standing with his back to the door.”

“You saw him two nights earlier, and you were so scared you fainted. He was what was left behind of Joseph Kalendar. Maybe I see him more often than you do because I’m related to him. And maybe this Sherman Park Killer is stirring him up.”

“Stuff like that doesn’t happen. Parts of people aren’t left behind. The only person who sees dead people is Haley Joely Osmond, or whatever his name is.”

“Joel Haley Osmond,” Mark said, thinking that did not sound quite right, either. “Only, you’re wrong. A lot of people see dead people—the part left behind. Don’t you think? A friend of yours dies, and one day you’re walking down the street and you look in a window and just for a second you see him in there. The next day, maybe you see him getting on a bus, or walking across a bridge. That’s the part of him that’s left behind.”

“Yeah, left behind in you.”

“In you, right. That’s what I’m talking about.”

“But you never heard of this guy.”

“My mother knew all about him. She must have worried about him, she must have been afraid of him. This guy had to be a big deal in my mother’s life! Don’t you think some of that could have passed into me?”

“You’re crazy,” Jimbo said.

“No, I’m not. Parents pass things on. Things they have no idea they’re passing on, those things especially they pass on to their children.”

As if to put an end to this conversation, Mark stood up and glanced around. A few adults were hurrying homeward through the park. Patrolman Jester stared thoughtfully at an empty place on the other side of the walkway. Together, the boys noticed that the air had begun to darken.

Jimbo stood up, too, looking a bit belligerent. “That doesn’t explain how you can see Joseph Kalendar, who’s been dead for twenty-five years!”

Mark and Jimbo walked, their pace slower than usual, down the path to Sherman Boulevard.

“I don’t think I actually saw Joseph Kalendar. I think I saw the Dark Man, the part that’s left of Joseph