Chapter 6

My night shifts were over, but I wanted to be the one to take Josh to school for his first day of kindergarten, so I swapped shifts this one day. There was no problem at all when we reached his room. All of the friends his age were there. The room was ringed with concerned parents, waiting to see how things were going to go with the kids as the teacher introduced herself. I watched Josh and when I saw that he was okay with being in school, I stopped into the Dollar Store to tell Mary that Josh handled his first day just fine.

I came out of the store and met Max coming in. He said he was hoping to find me as he wanted to tell me what happened after I left yesterday. "Dirk, you are a genius. You laid a guilt trip on those guys that can't be matched. Just telling them what you could do, without threatening them--I never would have thought of that. You also caused some dissension among them. Three of them are blaming Bob for leading them into this. The thing is they all know if one of them goes down, they all will. There is no way to split them apart from the evidence you have."

"I know. Actually I expect to hear from one or two of them to see if they can do something to keep me from making the disk public. My oldest neighbor, Bing, looked really devastated. His wife is pregnant and is almost ready to deliver. She must have shut him off and that is why he went after Mary when the chance presented itself."

"I think you are right. I wish Bing was the one I had asked to provide a ride that night. None of this would have happened."

"Don't blame yourself too much. Mary is still the one that brought this about with her teasing over the years. She knows it and has freely admitted it. She is resigned to bearing a child as retribution for her past behavior. The thing is, I'm the one that it places an extra burden on. We just can't afford another kid right now."

"Do you want me to put pressure on the four of them to help you out financially? After all one of them got her pregnant and all four are equally guilty."

"Not yet. Mary and I haven't talked about it to decide what we are going to do. We still have some time before having an abortion isn't an option."

"Before you decide to terminate the fetus, let me know. I might help you myself. I cringe at the idea of destroying a life. That is my personal feeling of course."

"I'm glad to hear you say that. I'm like-minded. As I say, we haven't decided anything yet. On a different and less depressing subject, could I have a copy of those papers about that bakery that supplied the Oneida community? I found it most interesting. Wouldn't it be great if a replica could be developed and a bakery like the one that was there established? I noticed there were some bread recipes along with the description of the bakery itself."

"Sure you can have a copy. Can you come up now? I'm free and we could look them over together."

Max had me stay for lunch and I had one of the most enjoyable days I had in a long time. Mary and I had a lot of uncertain days ahead of us and I suppose this was pure escapism. I was able to disassociate myself from the recent problems and give my attention to something entirely different. I called Mary just before I went in to start my shift at three. She was upbeat and happy and complimented me on the successful installation of Josh at his first day at kindergarten. She was to pick him up so the little fellow was to see us on both ends of the day.

Twenty-five minutes of four I received a call from the school asking when Josh was going to be picked up. He was too small to walk home alone. A jolt went through me. Where was Mary? Why hadn't she gone after him? It was less than an hour ago that she said she would.

I called home and Edie answered. She didn't give me a chance to question her before she posed a demand. "Where's Mom and Josh? Mom promised she would always be here when I got home and she isn't here. I'm scared to be here by myself."

"Edith, please call Aunt Paula to come and stay with you. I'll find Mom. She must have got held up at work." I called the store. Mary had left at her usual time, which would have given her time to get Josh and be home before Edith arrived. I was worried. I went up to the CEO's office and informed him that I had trouble at home and asked him to get someone to cover for me. I went to the school, picked up Josh and headed for the police station. I informed them that I thought that Mary was missing and wanted to file a missing persons report.

The desk sergeant said I had to wait twenty-four hours. I asked what about the four guys you went to my house about ten days ago. One of them might have taken her. The police had their names and my wife had never explained to me fully what the men had been doing there. The sergeant finally assigned a detective to hear my complaint. He said he would check it out and get back to me. I went home.

Paula had arrived to be with Edith. I was frustrated as well as being almost out of my mind with concern for the safety of Mary. I just knew that one of the four guys had taken her and was going to harm her. Paul came in and commiserated with me. I thought of Max Stinger and I called him to let him know about Mary being missing.

Twenty minutes after I got home, the police called and said that Mary had been seen getting into a pick-up truck in the parking lot in front of the Dollar Store. The detective asked me if that was something Mary would have done willingly. I said no, definitely not! He said that they would now treat this as an abduction, although no weapons had been seen.

Max came in and we talked about what must have happened. Within a few minutes the detective I had talked to came to the door and said that the truck described by the witness matched one owned by Bob, my neighbor. He was on his way there now to interview Bob, if he was home.