Bernie said, “You back, Quinn? Yes, it sounds like Stoat, but what does that prove?”
“Nothing,” Quinn muttered.
“Nothing,” Forrest repeated into the phone for his brother. “So now what?”
“Me, I can do nothing. It is not my case. What will you two do?”
Forrest said, “I have no idea.”
Quinn stood up and said, “There are more things here we need to look at.”
He half expected Bernie to warn them about trespassing or staying out of it, letting the authorities take care of it. But Bernie did not respond like a cop. Instead, he said, “Stoat left nothing but ammunition in the gun cabinet?”
Forrest deployed his eyebrows and remained silent. Quinn said, “That’s right.”
“Then he has the guns. Keep a lookout. If he comes to the front door, you go out the back.”
• • •
After concluding the call to Bernie Morales, Forrest eyed his brother, checking on him without comment, glad that Quinn had broken down first. Forrest knew his own turn could come at any minute.
Quinn saw him watching and demanded peevishly, “What?”
“Nothing. I need to get out of this sicko room.” The sight of whips and leathers and dildos strewn on the bed made him queasy. He badly wanted to get out of this entire shadowy blue shack, but apparently Quinn had something else in mind. Turning sharply, Forrest headed into the living room.
It felt marginally less like a sauna in there. Forrest stood watching, numb and uncomprehending, as Quinn shoved the sofa back together. Once he had done that, the only things strewn in that room were videotapes, Disney cartoons, all over the floor. Forrest stared down at them.
Walking up to stand beside him, Quinn said quietly, “Exactly. A guy who comes fully equipped for sadomasochism, watching Bambi?”
Forrest stiffened. No longer numb, he felt sick. Defying his own queasiness, he picked up the first tape that came to hand, stuck it in the VCR, then sat on the sofa, grabbed the remote from its place on an end table, aimed, and clicked. The TV glowed to life.
The video started to run. There were no polite preliminaries, no introduction, no scene-establishing sequence, and it was not Bambi or any other Disney classic. It was a home video showing a man and a boy naked. What the man was getting ready to do to the boy shocked Forrest so badly that he could not take in everything at once. As if the film were illuminated by a strobe light, he could take in only shards out of sequence. Pubic hair, body hair, chest hair. Hollow chest and skinny, sloppy physique, folds of belly skin. Big-knuckled ink-stained hands grabbing the boy. Forrest bit his lip and had to close his eyes for a moment. He remembered as if in a bad dream that the kid had dark eyes yet blond hair kinked into cornrows. The man, the pervert, the pedophile, liked kinks. Forrest opened his eyes and for the first time focused on the man’s face, visible over the boy’s head. It was a face as ugly as the deed, acne-scarred skin dark with beard stubble, small stony eyes glittering with gratification. From the boy’s eyes flowed tears. The man grinned, and decaying teeth bristled from his mouth. In a raspy voice he urged, “Cry, baby boy, cry!”
“For God’s sake, turn it off,” begged Quinn from the other end of the sofa.
Forrest jumped up, tossed Quinn the remote, then ran to the bathroom, where he vomited. He had been forgetting to eat; there was not much for his stomach to puke except yellow bile, and it left a terrible taste in his mouth.
When he went back out, Quinn had the TV turned off.
“Wanna watch Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs?” Forrest tried to joke.
“No, thank you. Do you think that naked, nauseating old goat was Stoat?”
Forrest sat down, considering. “We don’t know, do we? Was there anything in the background to give us a clue?”
“I don’t remember, but I think the background was just a cloth drape. We could check—”
“No way am I looking at that sick tape again.”
“What about the others? If they’re the same kind of thing with the same guy—”
“You go right ahead and play them if you want, Quinn. I’ll wait outside.”
Quinn’s only answer was not to answer and not to move. He sat on the opposite end of the sofa from Forrest, staring without focus. After a while he said as if talking aloud, “We have child porn. What help is that?”
“Huh?” Even to himself, Forrest sounded like a sulky teenager. He felt weak and faint and he didn’t like it, although he wasn’t about to admit it to his brother.
Quinn said, “How is it getting us any closer to finding Mom?”
Forrest thought, God, I want my mommy. The elemental force of the thought made him feel shaky all over. I really do. I want Mom. Why the hell didn’t I realize that before she disappeared?